Archangel
by SkylartheGrey
Summary: (Kinda AU): Shepard is just a tired doctor, working on Omega, who wants nothing more than to curl up, watch her favorite elcor soap opera and eat the best Asari-Asian cuisine that the station has to offer. However, on her way home, she finds a mysterious, wounded turian that goes by the moniker, Archangel.
1. Chapter 1

" _Ker-chht!_ Earth-clan, please calm down. I already told you that your order isn't ready yet." The volus across the counter proclaimed (boldly). She slammed one hand down on the cheap barrier while the other was used to wave a finger threateningly in the volus's face. The tacky and worn krogan hula dancer salt-and-pepper shakers quivered loudly from the force of her wrath.

"And I already told _you_ over the phone that if my order wasn't ready by the time I walked through those doors that I would raze this whole goddamn place to the ground!" She snapped, waving the aforementioned finger wildly in the poor cashier's face.

'I can hardly- _ker-chtt!—_ be blamed for what goes on in the kitchen." He answered, his voice calm despite her hysterics.

"Listen here, I have been pulling patients for the past…" she haphazardly tossed her arm out to pull back the sleeve of her lab coat and expose her watch, "sixteen and a half hours and if I don't get my food, I will lose my damn mind!"

"Please, this is getting ridiculous." He pleaded with her, gesturing for her to seat herself on one of the dilapidated seats near the shop's window.

"Tell me to calm down one more time, Boran Cal and I swear to Blasto that I'll beat you so hard that they'll make you the next Jackson 5 member." She snapped again, raising her fist to emphasize her point. The volus shook his head, unafraid.

"I am not Earth-clan – _ker-chht!—_ I don't get the reference." He reminded her politely. Shepard felt a gust of air abandon her lungs with a momentous (and frankly, overly dramatic) sigh and she flopped her head histrionically against the stained countertop to shield her face from view. While one hand fished in her pocket for a bundle of loose credit chits to deposit into the ancient TIPS jar, Boron Cal patted her head sympathetically.

"What the hell is going on out here?" A female voice called from the kitchen. Shepard didn't lift her head, so the volus spoke for her.

" _Ker-chht!_ I have a customer that's harassing me." He announced, lifting a strand of Shepard's trademark auburn hair to reveal the identity of the ruckus to his boss, "She threatened bodily harm so great that I'll become a Fifth of Jack."

"Jackson 5, Boran. Though, I could go for a fifth of Jack right about now." She corrected, lifting her head to wave hello to the owner as she stepped into the dining room. The woman clucked her tongue with disappointment.

"That's in poor taste." She chastised. Shepard allowed her face to flop back down onto her crossed arms.

"I know, Bev." Shepard groaned, her voice muffled.

"And the joke wasn't even that funny." She continued, leaning a hip against the counter casually.

"I _know_ , Bev."

"If you're going to make an offensive joke, you should at least make it a good one."

" _Thank you, Bev_. I'll keep that in mind for next time."

"Joking aside, is my order almost ready? My show starts in forty-five minutes and I still gotta take the 7 home." Shepard pleaded.

Though she had been giving Boran Cal a hard time, she knew he would never take her empty threats seriously, as she would _never_ actually speak to a member of the service industry like that. The Wacky Tentacle was the best hole-in-the-wall, Asian-Asari fusion restaurant that the Gozu district had to offer (though Shepard would argue that it was the best that the entire Terminus system had to offer, but that was a fight for another day). After a stressful day working as a physician in the lower wards, the deal was that Shepard could verbally abuse Boran Cal as much as she wished, so long as she kept her mouth shut about that weird mole he had her check out on his back that looked like a drunk hanar (which was a given regardless, of course—even in outer space there were laws similar to HIPAA).

"You know you can't rush the princess when she's in her element, doc. What did you even order today…?" Beverly's voice drifted off momentarily as she lifted up the order card from the cash register, only to click her tongue disapprovingly. " _Two_ orders of gamja jeon and an asari-bulgogi? No wonder it isn't ready."

"Don't judge me. It was one of the worst shifts I've ever had." Shepard moaned, taking a few steps back so she could nab one of the shoddy chairs and bring it closer to the counter.

"Even worse than that time that homeless guy threw his own – _ker-chht!-_ feces during a checkup?" Boran Cal asked helpfully. Shepard shivered.

"Yes, but—can we not mention that ever again? Please? Anyway. Today, I had the absolute worst patient. Male krogan with a perirectal abscess that—"

"What's that?" Bev interrupted, her interest pique. Though the young woman would never admit it, she loved listening to Shepard's war stories.

"A pocket of pus somewhere within the immediate vicinity of the butth—"

"I think I just threw up in my mouth a little. But go on, go on." Bev interrupted, holding her hands up to gesture that she did not need to hear the remainder of the sentence.

"Alright. So, this patient was a krogan male, which already starts things off on a bad foot, _and_ a Red Sand junkie who taken to injecting his fix into his…" Bev began to make a face, so Shepard changed tactic, "he began injecting in _that_ neighborhood. When we put scalpel to scale, it turned out that this "pocket" of pus had tunneled about a foot into this guy's abdomen. What came out… I can only describe the texture as…" she swabbed a hand down her face, as though attempting to wipe away the memory itself, "space-cow afterbirth and hanar jelly. As for the smell? I had to take an alcohol shower just to be able to breathe! And that was just my _first_ patient." Shepard hid her face behind her hands and groaned loudly. She had reached a point of exhaustion where it hurt just to have her eyes open. Bev cooed gently and patted Shepard's shoulder.

"Here, I think you earned yourself a doughnut while you wait. On the house." Beverly told her, handing her the homemade pastry she had pulled fresh from the rack. Shepard thanked her with gusto as though it was her first morsel in months.

"You guys are saints. Anyway, I just want to get home, eat the station's best bulgogi with some cheap Moscato, and watch my favorite elcor soap-opera while wearing a pair of fuzzy penguin slippers."

Bev tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and rolled her eyes as she began to ready the already clean, yet faded, bar. "I can't believe you watch that crap, doc." Shepard raised a hand defensively.

"Excuse me, but _Heartwarmingly: I Love You_ is a masterpiece and I won't have you slander it." She defended hotly before looking at the pastry in her hand, "even if you bribe me with cookie-covered doughnuts."

"Bev's right—that show is the cheesiest thing that O-TV has to offer. Had you not made a habit of coming here almost every day, I would say you had the worst taste imaginable." Bev's asari wife purred, gliding out of the kitchen with a plastic bag full of Styrofoam cartons.

Talia placed the bag next to Baron Cal and slid an arm around the human's waist. The two of them together were beautiful, the type of couple that one only saw in the fashion magazines with expensive clothes and haughty expressions. The Wacky Tentacle was their lovechild, the culmination of their efforts after Bev ran away from home to marry the asari lover her Jamaican-Korean parents had disapproved of. While eons away from living in luxury, the little hole in the wall had grown to be a very successful operation and it only strengthened their bond. Shepard was fairly sure that the frequency of her visits here after graveyard shifts was more than enough to keep the small business afloat, but she didn't say anything.

"Talia, you make the food, so you're the only person here I won't fight with. But, say that to me on my turf and we'll have to duke it out." Shepard admonished, pulling the lab coat off to insulate the food better. The graceful alien leaned her head against her lover's shoulder and chuckled.

"Go home, Shepard. I want to open my shop up already." Bev scolded in a motherly voice.

"You got it. I still need to get on the 7 anyway so make it in time to see what crazy shenanigan's Potzi and Hansar got up to this week." Shepard responded, shoving the chair she had occupied back into place. She unlocked the front door and flipped the switch on for them before leaving, making sure to call her goodbyes over shoulder.

Shepard rounded the corner and made her way down the flight of stairs that led to Omega's awful subway system. The knowledge that she would soon be curled up in bed, drinking a glass of cheap wine was strong enough to ensure that not even the questionably potent aroma of vagabond urine and rotting garbage could tarnish her happiness. When her ride finally arrived, she ran across the platform and seated herself beside two gossiping, matron-staged asari.

Shepard never spoke to these women, but they tended to ride the public transport system around this time nearly every shift and she had grown comfortable with their "familiar-but-not-really"-ness. She closed her eyes and curled the warm bundle of food close to her chest so that she could listen to their mindless prattle in peace. Once they got off, she knew it would only be one more stop until she was home.

"Someone should really talk to Aria, this is getting out of hand! I swear! In the past three months I have been robbed twice— _twice!_ And the last two robbers must be idiots because I don't even have anything valuable to rob because of the jackass that got me a year ago. I can't wait to save enough credits to get off this shithole."

"Ain't that the truth? But, you know what I heard? There's some guy in Kima District that's been showing the gangs what-for!"

"Pfft! Yeah, right. There's always some shithead kid that thinks he can make a difference on this rock. Until he gets himself dismembered by Garm or whoever the biggest bully is that week."

"No, this one is serious. You know what I heard? My cousin has a friend who has a neighbor who has a daughter whose _boyfriend_ was getting mugged the other night by some vorcha and this guy just swooped in like-like that human superhero and saved the day. What's that human's name? All those humans sound alike."

"Catman."

" _Catman!_ That's right. Oh, that Jokester and Harlequin are my favorite couple. So cute!"

"I know, right? But have you heard of that new movie that's coming out…."

With their conversation veering off into the extraordinarily mundane, Shepard allowed her mind to drift until she felt the telltale jostling movement beside her that meant that the two women were getting off the train. She felt herself perk up: only one more stop, four blocks and a metal door separated her from her dingy studio apartment. The way she mowed down the other passengers to get off at her stop would have made any linebacker proud (even if she did receive death threats in the process).

When she was about two blocks away from home, she kissed the warm plastic top of her take out bag, "Soon, my pretty. Soon!"

That's when she heard it. A low moan. At first, she confused it for the regular groans and whines of the station, but then she heard it again. It was definitely a person and they were definitely in pain. She frowned at her take-out.

"Not so soon, it seems." She lamented in a whisper, before closing her eyes as to better locate the source of the whining. It only took a moment before she found it. The sound originated from a dark alley, obscured by a dumpster and a mountain range of black trash bags. _Shit_. Was this a setup or was someone actually in need of help? She sighed. She did not waste all that time in school to become a doctor, just to turn a blind eye when the going got tough.

"Hello?" She stood at the lip of the alley, attempting to find the outline of a person somewhere in the darkness. The moans silenced immediately. She squinted, but only blackness waited for her. She took a step into the alley, " _Hello?"_

No one answered. She dared not risk going any further into the void. Her heart was racing. This is how good people die: by sticking their noses where they don't belong. This was how defenseless women got raped. She was stupid for doing this. Whoever was in here did not wish to be found, even if they were in pain. She had seen such things before on her travels. It was likely a gang member who had wound up on the wrong turf, or a drug addict that was too embarrassed to be seen. She went to take a step back.

There was a loud clatter of metal crashing into metal and the unmistakable thump of a heavy body hitting the ground. A pained expletive echoed against the walls of the alley and startled her. The noise was so sudden that she was forced to clasp a hand over her mouth to keep from shrieking. The groan devolved into a series of labored wheezes and coughs. She leapt into action without hesitating, hurtling over decaying food and empty beer cans to get to her target with her omni-tool illuminating the way.

The source of the racket was a turian, likely male (she could not be certain as he wore a helmet) in cobalt blue armor, nursing what looked like a gunshot wound to the right lower quadrant. She maneuvered to near the curled, panting mass… that is, until he drew his gun and pointed it at her.

"Don't… get… any… closer." He warned in breathless pants, finger on the trigger. As she had been trained when she first landed on Omega, she flung her hands above her head to reveal that she was armed with only a takeout bag and dirty lab coat.

"I'm a doctor." She announced, "You're hurt."

"I… don't need… your help." He panted, each word taking a momentous effort to get out. Fundamentals of emergency first aid: Airway, breathing, and circulation. Despite the labored breathing, he was speaking and conscious, which meant his airway was clear and he was capable of breathing on his own. She knew for certain he had sustained at least one wound, but without closer inspection, she could not tell if there were anymore. At a deliberately slow pace, she fell into a crouch. She was still at gun point and could not make any sudden moves. She placed the food and her lab coat on the ground before immediately raising her empty, outstretched hands by her head.

"Yes, you do." She asserted in a stern voice, her eyes focused on the weapon pointed at her chest.

"Why should… I… trust.. you?" He panted, the gun was beginning to waver. He needed help, _immediately._

"Listen to me carefully. You don't have enough time for me to go over everything that can go wrong, but that is a gunshot wound in your _abdomen_. That means there is a very high chance that the slug hit an organ. Now, even if it didn't, you can still die of blood loss, shock, or infection. You'll probably faint from anemia before any of that happens, and that'll give whoever shot you a better chance of finding your unconscious body. Now that you have been informed, let me say this. As a medical professional, I have taken an oath to uphold my patient's autonomy, so I will not give care without your consent. If you refuse me again, I'll call an emergency service, go home and eat my Asari take-out without losing a wink of sleep." She jerked her chin down at the bundle of food at her knees.

The gun continued to waver for just a few moments longer…. And then dropped. She rushed to the turian, grabbing her lab coat and immediately applying pressure to the wound in his gut. Before she could assess more of the damage, he gripped her wrist and forced her to look up.

"No hospitals… too… dangerous…they will be looking… _please._ " He gasped. Her face tightened, but she nodded. This was probably going against every medical manual ever written.

"I live about a block away. Do you think you can make it that far?" She asked hastily, before glancing around the alley for any "they"s that might swoop down from above. He nodded weakly.

"Can you tell me if you have any other wounds? I don't want to move you if you have a spinal injury."

"No spine… definitely arm." He panted. She looked down and sure enough, blood was seeping out of a hole in the left anterior bicep, slightly above the elbow. Had that bullet strayed just a few inches to the right, he would have been dead in the water.

"Okay, I'm going to take the armor plate off. Then, I'm going to make a tourniquet out of my coat sleeve and a Swiss army knife I have in my pocket." She told him carefully, not wanting to risk him pulling the gun on her the moment she retrieved the knife. He, again, nodded weakly and she went to work. When the makeshift tourniquet was set, she pulled his arm up and over her shoulders and assisted him into a standing position.

Turians were tall naturally, but this one towered well over her 5 foot 1 inch frame. She supported a good amount of his bulk and stepped forlornly over her bag of takeout. His head lolled atop hers, and though the whole debacle was stressful, she gritted her teeth and pushed through it. When she neared the entrance of the alley, she could hear voices coming from down the street, heading their way. As the voices came into clarity, her patient began to tense and scramble for the piece at his hip.

 _Shit, fuck, fucking shit._ She thought to herself, realizing that they must have been his attackers. She went to sit him back down, but he protested. She pressed a finger to her lips.

"Wait here. I got this." She assured gently. By holding him, she had already amassed a blotch of navy blue blood on her seafoam green scrubs that looked like a dollar-store Rorschach test. She bent over and ran her hand across the portion of his armor that had been coated in his blood and rubbed the warm liquid over her arms for added _oomf_.

She edged towards the entrance of the alley and found three vorcha and two krogan in bright red armor pestering an elderly drell situated on the stoop of his apartment. The vorcha were assessing the neighborhood while the krogan strong-armed the withered alien. She was not surprised to see Blood Pack here. Though she had specifically chosen to live in an apartment in a supposed "DMZ", the Blood Pack and the Blue Suns flanked the district and enjoyed making their presence known.

"You sure you haven't seen a turian running around, old man? Blue armor? Looking to be _killed_?" One of the krogan roared at the drell, who was shaking his head feverishly and shaking in fear. She readied herself with a deep breath before running out of the alley, making a beeline towards the criminals.

"Oh thank God!" She gushed, as she neared them. The vorcha and krogan looked up, the mindless henchmen dropping their guns as the petite, attractive human neared them covered in blood that was clearly not her own. "That jerk practically killed me running into me so fast! Look at me! I could have _died_!"

The krogan leader released his hold on the drell's shirt and sauntered smugly towards her.

"Why don't you tell me which way this jerk went, sweetheart? We'll take care of him for you." He told her, pinching her chin between his fingers. She fought the urge to yank her face back, but she was nothing, if not a great actress.

"He went _that_ way. It looked like he was heading towards 23rd and Welkin." She told them hastily, insisting that her attacker was heading in the complete opposite direction of her house. The krogan smiled at her before jerking his head at the remainder of his cronies. His fat, sausage fingers slid away from her blood stained face and he lingered for just a second longer than his men.

"Thanks, sweetheart. Maybe when I'm done with him, I'll come back and take real good care of you to show my gratitude." He purred with a wink, before running off. Suppressing a shudder, she waited at the stoop until the goons were out of sight before daring to return to her ward. It was only by grace of some kind of powerful being that this poor man was still conscious. She got him back into position as he mumbled incoherent an incoherent thanks in her ear and the two of them hoofed the remaining distance to her apartment.

Once inside, she put every lock on the door into place and gathered a clean sheet and pillow for her guest. She laid him out of the floor and began stripping him of his armor. When she made an effort to remove his helmet, his hand caught her again and he shook his head.

"I need to." She announced.

"No. My identity. No." He gasped. She yearned to scream that he was practically naked, but instead she took in a deep, calming breath.

"You know what? Fine. I don't have the energy to argue." She snapped, before leaping across the room to get her go-bag.

She came to this shithole of a rock in order to help the dying and destitute— of which, there was an endless supply. Which meant that she had a whole arsenal of medical supplies stashed in a hidden compartment under her floorboards, waiting to be used at a moment's notice. Most of it was taken from her time on the Citadel, but the majority of it had been amassed during her time here on Omega. It wasn't until she got here that she grew to appreciate the wonders of the Black Market. With the duffle bags of equipment in hand, she returned to the dying man on her apartment floor.

Then, Shepard started doing what she did best.

It seemed like hours passed before she was finished. She swatted at an errant strand of hair with the back of her forearm and let out a sigh of relief. Though both she and her floor were coated in his blood, the turian was now stitched up, medicated and stable (though, his blood pressure was _definitely_ low). His chest rose and fell in deep, soothing breaths.

She leaned back, proud of her work. She meant to get to her feet, when the patient's hand fumbled groggily for hers. She started, for just a moment, before realizing what he was doing. She pressed her other hand atop his gently. The turian's grip on her hand loosened almost immediately as the anesthetics began to overwhelm him once more.

After covering him with another sheet (turians don't like the cold), she took a shower and changed her clothes. She was so tired, she couldn't even lament the fact that her stomach was howling at her for not feeding it greasy potato pancakes and asari beef. In fact, she was asleep before her head even hit the pillow.

When she next came to, she was astonished to find that she was completely alone. The only evidence of what had transpired only a few hours before was a pile of soiled linens and medical equipment… but, no… that wasn't right. The mysterious turian had left her one more thing… a token of his gratitude.

It was a note, scribbled hastily on the back of a crumbled receipt. She read it and couldn't help but laugh.

 _I'm sorry about your takeout. Next round's on me._

 _-Archangel._


	2. Chapter 2

It had been several days since the mysterious "Archangel" incident, when she was startled awake by the screaming trill of her doorbell. The obnoxious noise had her (literally) rolling out of bed and onto the floor. A raspy, _sonofabitch!_ proceeded a loud thump and she was suddenly a pile of limbs and sheets tangled on the floor beside her bed. The room spun dizzily around her in undulating waves as she sat, attempting to get her bearings straight. She then tried to get to her feet. It required more than one attempt.

"Coming!" She called groggily after managing to attain a vertical position. She shuffled lazily towards the door, trying her hardest to pretend that the room didn't feel like some kind of fun house mirror.

She stumbled over an empty bottle. Today was her day off. Several hours earlier, she had decided she would celebrate this fact in one of the few ways Omega allowed: by getting painstakingly, balls to the walls obliterated. She had been enjoying one of those horrifically fantastic psychedelic dreams that only a bottle of imported ryncol and bone-crippling anxiety could provide. And yet, someone had the _audacity_ to ring her doorbell at _four in the afternoon_ and _unintentionally_ wake her up. The gall of some people.

When she opened the door, she found herself face-to-face with a human male dressed entirely in black. Initially, he seemed taken aback by her unkempt appearance, glancing curiously at her eccentric lounging attire. Her normally coiffed hair was wrangled into a sloppy, cascading knot at the top of her head. Across her chest, the oversized t-shirt she wore read, "Honorary Urdnot" with the grinning face of her favorite patient (a krogan named Wrex) giving the viewer a cheeky thumbs up below the words. This was one of her most treasured possessions, as she had earned the shirt (much to Wrex's dismay) by beating the warlord in a drinking contest one night in Chora's Den. The stranger's eyes quickly shot up to meet her own and he schooled his expression into submission, coughing nervously into his fist.

"Those are some interesting slippers." He commented, nodding towards the pair of soft pink piglet slippers that adorned her feet. She glanced down momentarily.

"Thanks. My brother gave 'em to me." She answered blandly. She cocked her head, "What can I do for you?"

"I'm here for a Doctor Shepard." He announced formally, his accent hinting at a New England origin. Sighing, she leaned her forehead against the doorframe to keep from collapsing onto the floor. _It should be illegal for daytime to be so bright_.

"I'm sorry, but unless you're having an emergency, today's my day off." She answered.

"I'm not here for that. I'm a friend." He answered, his voice dipping low at the end so only the two of them could possibly hear. Her eyes narrowed.

"Don't find many of those around these parts… what kind of friend?" She asked suspiciously.

"The best kind of friend—I'm a friend with stuff." He responded slyly. She found herself swabbing an impatient hand down her face and pushing away from the doorframe.

"Are we going to beat around the bush until the varrens come home or are you planning on telling me what's up? Because right now I'm sleeping off some Tuchanka's Finest and you got three heads." She spat, uninterested in participating in another round of Omega's verbal chess matches.

"You can handle that stuff? Didn't it cause that one guy to start setting off radiological ala- right." Her expression had stopped him mid-thought, "A turian patient of yours told me to come here."

"I'm afraid that I've had quite a few of those. Care to elaborate?" She asked softly. Despite her cool veneer, her insides twisted with dread. Of course she knew who he was referring to.

"Oh, I'm sure you know him. He would have stood out." He told her, leaning in.

"Was he the guy with the flaccid fringe and the… you know?" She made an obscure hand gesture (to represent something that not even she knew what she was attempting to refer to).

The stranger's cheeks flushed, "Christ, I hope not."

" _Oh!_ Was he the one that told me he had, "a hard nugget" after nearly getting scalped during a sky-car collision was still somehow conscious enough to text his friends?"

"Okay, surely you're messing with me." The stranger stated plainly, eyebrows furrowed. Shepard continued her farce and shrugged her shoulders.

" _Me_ messing with _you_? Perish the thought. I take my profession very seriously! If those patients aren't your guy, there's not much I can do for you. Now, if you'll excuse me…" She went to shut the door, but before the lock could latch, the stranger stuck his foot out. She opened her mouth to squawk out a protest and he stopped her by extending a placating palm.

"Listen, I understand that you don't trust strangers, but I'm not the bad guy. He really did send me." He told her. She narrowed her eyes.

"Unless you want to lose your foot, get it the hell away from my door." She growled dangerously.

"I'm serious. He sent me here to give you this." He held out an old fashioned cell phone from the 2000's, clearly a burner phone. He held it out for her to take, but she slapped his hand away.

"My momma always told me not to take candy from strangers."

"He said that if you didn't believe me, that I should mention something about a note he left about take-out food on the back of a receipt for a…" the man coughed into his hand, "motion activated toilet night light."

Shepard instantly froze. There was no way the guy could have known about that note (and the odd contents of the receipt with which it had been written on) without having been told about it by her mysterious turian. In fact, she had tucked that scrap of paper into her bedside drawer, a trophy from that peculiar night. The stranger noticed the change in her demeanor and immediately withdrew his foot, a triumphant smile appearing.

"He also mentioned that your taste in apartment furnishing was eccentric." The guy commented, a bit of his mysterious veneer beginning to dissipate.

"I…do have a tendency to make regrettable online purchases while drunk." Shepard confessed. She allowed her door to open slightly.

"Regrettable? Are you kiddin'? That's the greatest thing I've ever heard of. After he told me that motion activated toilet night lights were a thing, I went out and bought one myself!" He told her. She covered her mouth and began to laugh.

"You're _kidding_ me!"

"My wife _insists_ on keeping the house so goddamn dark, you could poke your eyeball and still not see your finger. If this keeps me from breakin' my fuckin' knee every time I need to take a midnight piss, it'll be worth every credit." He proclaimed, every ounce of that careful mask falling away as they talked about the revolutionary product.

"Amen!" she laughed, high-fiving over the fact that her drunk self had also tired of stubbing her toe every time she needed to ride the porcelain express. They shared a moment of glowing silence before she sheepishly reached for the phone he still held in his hand. He permitted her to take it and she twisted it nervously between her fingers. "How is he?"

"I won't lie, he ain't in the best of shape _but_ because of you, he's alive." The stranger answered, the laughter dying away.

"If he needs to assistance, I can be discreet. I can—"

He silenced her by pushing his palm out and shaking his head, "Nah, that guy's a—as you said—"tough nugget". Nothing short of a rocket to the face will stop him. He'll be fine." The stranger dismissed passively. Shepard felt slightly deflated, unsure of what to say next as she looked at the small weight in the palm of her hand. With the advent of omni-tools, she couldn't remember ever seeing anyone actually ever using a _cell-phone_. How nostalgic. It almost made her want to play that classic Earth band, the Backstreet Boys.

"I'm sorry about before, but—"

"Forget about it. Our line of work doesn't make us a trusting bunch either." He answered, offering her a smile. She gestured inside her house.

"Would you like to come in? Your 3 heads are starting to become one, but I can fix you something to eat." She offered kindly. He shook his head.

"Nah, I gotta run. Bossman has me running for him all day, but we'll be in touch." The stranger told her, jerking a thumb over his shoulder.

"Bossman? Puh! You would think nearly dying would make him rethink gang life." Shepard scoffed haughtily. The man smirked.

"We ain't a gang." He announced proudly. She cocked an eyebrow.

"Oh?"

"I can't say much… but, I think you'll find the 1900 news interesting tonight." He whispered, leaning in to make sure they weren't overheard.

"What's going to be on the 1900 news?" She asked hesitantly. Did she even want to know?

"I really ought to get going. It was nice meeting you, Shepard." He answered evasively, extending his hand. She rolled her eyes at his attempt to avoid her question, but shook his hand anyway.

"Call me Emma."

"Butler. We'll keep in touch. You need _anything_ , you use that." He said, pointing to the brick in her hand.

"I'll keep that in mind." She smiled, tapping the phone against her temple. He waved goodbye and she watched him spin on his heel. She remained in her doorway, watching Butler's frame getting smaller and smaller until he turned a corner and disappeared for good. She shook her head. What a bunch of weirdos (not that she was one to throw any stones).

Seeing as she had already managed the daunting task of getting out of bed, she figured she might as well make herself useful and grab the mail. As she meandered towards her mailbox, she flipped the phone open and to her great surprise, found a message already waiting for her there.

 _-[Archangel] 12:00_

 _Even if I wasn't bedridden, I've never been good at these sorts of things._

 _I just want to say thank you in the only way I can._

 _So._

 _Thanks._

Smirking to herself, she shuffled the pile of unwanted advertisements (and equally as unwanted bills) under her armpit so she could answer the message. With each step she took back to her apartment, her piglet slippers elicited a variety of oinks and squeals. These slippers never ceased to make her smile.

- _16:24_

 _While im happy to hear ur alrite, yu never hav to thank me for doing my job. Im a doctor._

For the first time in a long while, she found herself gravitating towards something. Had this all occurred a few hours prior, she would have been able to pass this excitement (?) off as the side effect of half a bottle of ryncol… but it wasn't. The truth of the matter was that this mysterious alien represented a rabbit hole she wanted to fall into. While she would never even consider the notion of switching careers, the path she had paved for herself left her with little money or downtime, and it felt like everything had blended into grey. Sure, Omega had an endless supply of patients with… interesting characters, but such personalities became repeat offenders after a time. This… this was unique. She inhaled quickly when the plastic vibrated, alerting her to the incoming message.

 _-[Archangel] 16:31_

 _I wasn't aware that they teach doctors to confront Blood Pack members in medical school._

She laughed. So, her mysterious Archangel had a sense of humor. As she waited in between texts, she began to sift through her fridge, trying to find something to silence her growling stomach—She was hungrier than a two month old krogan.

 _-16:31_

 _Trade secret im afraid. Sworn to secrecy n all tht_

 _-[Archangel] 16:32_

 _Did they also train you how to handle the situation if said Blood Pack members find out you lied to them regarding their victim?_

 _-16:33_

 _They dont, but when they came back i think i handled em well enuf_

 _-[Archangel] 16:33_

 _? THEY CAME BACK?_

 _What happened?_

 _-16:35_

 _They found me omw home frm seeing patients. Nothin happened_

 _-[Archangel] 16:35_

 _Do explain._

She had been preparing herself for a grand feast of powdered eggs and bacon when she received his response. She placed all of her supplies on the kitchen counter so that she could answer. She smiled at his immediate worrying over her. Was that not her job? When did the positions get reversed? She typed away at the small keyboard, using only text shorthand due to her lack of experience with the cell phone's tiny keyboard.

 _-16:38_

 _Ehh, about a day or 2 afterwards tey recognized me and called me out. I told em tht they had the wrong person._

 _-[Archangel] 16:38_

 _And…?_

She seasoned the food as best she could and set it on the stove to cook. She cursed in between glances at her messages when the oil started to pop and send little angry prickles against her forearms.

 _-16:40_

 _They insisted tht thy new me. I calld them racist n asked if they thot all us humans looked alike. Made a big stink until they sed i wasnt worth the effort n left_

 _-Archangel] 16:41_

 _I don't know whether to think you're brilliant or insane._

 _-16:42_

 _I like to think tht i walk that line every day_

It took her gentleman caller a longer time to respond and she took this opportunity to set her food on weathered plates with cute animal faces (today she had a red panda). She ate her food slowly, glancing at her phone with barely concealed anticipation.

 _-[Archangel] 16:56_

 _I can't believe that I allowed you to operate on me._

She had finished washing her dishes when she received his next message and her head literally jerked back when she read it. What balls! She saved his life and this was what he told her? It took a few attempts to respond because her angry thumb kept missing the intended keys.

 _-17:10_

 _Excuse me?_

 _[Archangel] 17:11_

 _Clearly, you're insane_

 _-17:20_

 _Well_

 _…_

 _Thats gratitude for you_

 _[Archangel] 17:22_

 _You're a small human who willingly entered a dark alley by herself, armed with only a Swiss army knife and didn't flinch when a wounded turian aimed a gun at her._

 _Clearly, you're insane_

 _._

She found herself chuckling. Her Archangel really did have a sense of humor, on par with her own demented version.

 _-17:23_

 _If i was afraid of the dark n dirty, i wud never hav come to omega._

 _-[Archangel] 17:24_

 _What exactly brought you to Omega then?_

For a single moment, she considered telling him the truth that no one knew. There was a sort of comfort in talking to a complete stranger—they were so far removed from you that it was almost like confiding in a diary. She glanced down at the screen and decided against it.

 _-17:24_

 _To help_

Was all she wrote. Not technically a lie.

 _-{Archangel] 17:37_

 _Yes, but with your skills, you could've "helped" anywhere. Why come to the armpit of the galaxy?_

 _-17:39_

 _Even the destitute deserve good healthcare…_

 _-[Archangel] 17:46_

 _So much that you work with them on a barter system, apparently._

She read this multiple times and yet, each time she was just as surprised as the last. When her patients couldn't afford to pay her in conventional ways (which most couldn't) she asked for them to assist in others. She had yet to deny anyone care, but she relied heavily on donations and any connections her patients might be able to establish. Yet, there was no way he could have possibly known that without looking into her. If he was doing that, what was he intending to find? Suddenly, this conversation seemed less exciting and more intimidating.

 _-17:47_

 _Should i be concerned tht ur lookin into me?_

 _-[Archangel] 17:52_

 _I was curious about the woman that saved me. Good hearted people on Omega are hard to find, why would I not want to learn more about you?_

 _-17:53_

 _U could hav… yo know… stayed n asked me if you wanted to kno._

 _-[Archangel] 17:59_

 _I couldn't._

 _-18:00_

 _O rly?_

 _-[Archangel] 18:46_

 _If I stayed, you would have been at risk and I wasn't going to let that happen._

 _-18:46_

 _Do explain_

 _-[Archangel] 18:47_

 _Do you even know who you're talking to? What Archangel is?_

She paused. She simply assumed it was his moniker (as no turian would ever name their child something human like Archangel) and nothing more.

 _-18:50_

 _When yu left tht note i assumed it was ur nickname. Y?_

 _-[Archangel] -18:59_

 _You might want to tune into Omega News_

She noticed the time and remembered what Butler had advised her to do earlier. The 1900 news was about to start! She plopped herself down onto the threadbare sheets and began to fiddle through the channels until she found the news.

She grabbed her bottle of Moscato and sipped as the news anchors introduced themselves and the latest breaking news. She nearly poured the drink on herself when they shorted the intro song to cut to a reporter standing outside of a tall building set aflame in the Gozu district, only about five or six blocks away from The Wacky Tentacle. The polished salarian standing in the chaos held a finger to his ear piece and reported excitedly.

"…As you can see behind me, the notorious slave smuggler, Varg Maliones's base of operations has been set aflame after experiencing a security malfunction. Those that had managed to make it out, mostly slaves that were being prepared for transport, claimed that the building began to experience power outages for about an hour before the security system failed completely and the building's mechs began to turn on Maliones's men. Talitha, one of those being held captive, claimed that one of the mechs actually _protected_ the slaves in her cell block and escorted them out of the building where emergency rescue workers were waiting. At this point it's unclear how many remain trapped inside the building, but CCTV cameras in nearby areas show that at least six detonation devices were planted at vital structural points within the building. Witnesses in the area also claim to have heard anywhere from twelve to thirty-three shots around seven pm, but no shooter has been identified. Many are claiming that this seems like the work of Archangel, an anonymous vigilante who got his start in the Kima District, taking down drug smugglers, but as of right now, nothing has been confirmed…"

Without thinking, she snatched the cellphone she had placed on her bedside table and pressed the option to call the turian on the other end. It rang… and rang… and rang… and then she got voicemail. She thought about leaving a message, hesitating as the cool, female voice instructed her to leave a message before hanging up. She threw the phone towards her feet as though it had burned her, but for what reason, she could not say. She continued to watch the reporter, gaping at the screen like a fish out of water.

Eventually, she picked up the phone and decided to text. Could she have put him at risk by calling? No, he must have been smarter than that. Her thoughts were racing. It felt so odd to think that just a few days ago, the person that had was the root of all that destruction had been splayed out on her bedroom floor. She had been so preoccupied with mending the gaping holes in the tall turian's body, that she did not spare so much as a single thought as to how he might have received them. On Omega, it was always just safe to assume that bullets were caused by gang violence

 _-19:15_

 _Holy shit. R u safe?_

 _-[Archangel] 19:15_

 _Don't worry, all of us are fine._

 _But, now do you understand?_

 _I sent Butler today to make sure that you were safe and that you stay that way._

 _I chose a form of communication that no one knows how to hack into anymore. I know I'm putting you at risk, but this way you have a direct line to me and my team._

 _-19:16_

 _But y do this?_

The minutes ticked by. She grew antsy, she wanted her answer. Her nerves were on fire. She had many interesting patients, but this one toppled them all. She paced the length of the room, checking her phone at odd intervals. When it continued to proclaim "no new notifications", she sat herself at the dining table and attempted to preoccupy herself with the mail she had gathered earlier. There were a few catalogues that she leafed through. She was bookmarking a page for a pizza shaped sleeping bag that would be simply perfect for her trip back to Tuchanka when he finally responded. She grabbed the phone faster than she could blink.

 _-[Archangel]_ _19:40_

 _Because I find myself drawn to you_

Her breathing hitched. She waited for him to add something, anything. When he didn't, she typed out:

 _-19:45_

 _Because i saved ur life?_

She placed the phone down and tried to calm her nerves. She couldn't remember the last time someone had made her heart race like this. Was it just the Moscato? It had to have been. She glanced back down at the table and noticed a nondescript envelope without a sending or return address. Hesitantly, she lifted it, peeling the top part off so she could pull out a slip of paper.

Her eyes scanned the handwritten letter. Initially, she thought it might have been her enigmatic turian, but the handwriting didn't match. She scanned the note and her stomach lurched. The room grew hot. The letter fluttered to the floor carelessly to the floor as she bolted towards her bathroom. The motion activated night light, just under the rim of her toilet, lit up baby blue as she flung herself against the porcelain and expelled the contents of her stomach in a sick rush. Suddenly, her penpal didn't seem so important. When she was finished, she curled into a ball on her bed and downed the remainder of the Moscato. She could not even be bothered to get the phone and read the last message Archangel had sent her.

 _-[Archangel] 19:55_

 _No. I find myself drawn to you because…_

 _Well_

 _You're the type of woman that isn't afraid to take on the dark and dirty._


	3. Chapter 3

"If your nausea is worsening, allow me to—" Before Shepard could even get through the remainder of her sentence, the blonde teen lurched forward and released the contents of her stomach into the blueberry Big Gulp slushie she had been nursing. Shepard carefully pulled the greasy strands of the teen's hair out of the line of fire. The air was filled with an acrid stench as the girl heaved loudly into the comically large plastic container of sugary ice. Once the heaving ceased, Shepard retrieved the biohazard bucket from beside the sink and a handful of towels. Sheepishly, the teen thanked the doctor and dabbed at the lingering chucks of sick around her mouth.

"That's some precise aim you got there," Shepard complimented, "Not a single drop on me or my floor. Annie Oakley would be impressed."

The girl gave a weak chuckle, but abruptly stopped when she felt her stomach lurch, "My friends told me that you were funny." She dropped the remaining contaminated items into the crimson bin. Shepard traded the girl a bottle of crisp water for the container full of vomit. In the back of her mind, Shepard thought, " _This has been the worst trade deal in the history of trade deals, maybe ever"._ She stifled a laugh at her awful sense of humor.

"What they _should_ have told you was to lay off the red sand." Shepard rebuked, crossing her arms across her chest. The girl froze and glanced up at the doctor with watery, red eyes. In an attempt to disguise her guilt, the girl donned a mask of cool indifference.

"I don't know what you're talking about." She answered nonchalantly.

Shepard's head reeled back sarcastically and her eyebrows flew skyward, "Oh, no?"

The patient scooted further back against the paper-lined chair, trying her hardest to look like the epitome of angelic innocence, "I've never even seen red sand before." Shepard jerked her chin at the hazards bin.

" _Really_? Then why is there red puke in my wastes container?"

This caught the girl off guard, "Uh… Hot Cheetos?"

"And Takis?" Shepard smirked, knowing she had the girl pinned. It didn't take much to crack that disguise she had been pretending to have.

"You're not going to tell my folks are you? They'll kill me!" The girl pleaded desperately.

"No, I won't inform you parents- not that I believe for a moment that you gave me a real ID. I'm just happy that you sought medical attention when you needed it. And if you can do me a favor, pass that message along to your friends that use as well. I don't want to hear about any kids dying because they're too afraid to come here. If you can't get them here, call me and I'll try to come as soon as possible." Shepard instructed, pulling off her gloves.

"Thank you." The girl's voice was trembling.

Shepard glanced up from her latex gloves and gave the girl a long look. The kid was staring up at the florescent lights, blinking away the glassiness from her eyes. _Such pride_ , Shepard thought. She pitied the teen. The girl was likely one of the many children here on Omega whose support system at home was less than stellar and she was made all the worse as a result. A crime-ridden, terrorist-harboring, slave-dealing floating metallic shithole of a rock was not the idyllic setting to raise a family. However, that did not stop many from trying (and failing). Though she was a doctor, there was a limit to what she could do for all these kids that fell through the cracks, and each time they veered off for the worse, it broke her heart.

"Unfortunately, there's not much more my clinic can provide for you at this point, but that doesn't mean I'm through with you," Shepard said, dropping her gloves into the garbage and leaning against the counter casually. "The stuff you're getting into isn't a joke, but I also know that life here isn't easy. If you need a place to vent, you are always welcome here. If that's not for you, that's fine too. There's another clinic in the Gozu district you can always visit. It's run by a crazy salarian by the name of Mordin Solus. He's an old friend, just mention me and he'll take good care of you."

The patient thanked Shepard earnestly and scrambled to leave. Shepard sighed and escorted her to the front, hating that she had such a limited ability to help in such cases. When the girl was out of sight, she ordered the VI to write up the documentation and send a mobile unit to properly dispose of the waste bin. She was planning on heading towards her desk when the bell chimed, alerting her to the presence of someone entering her waiting room. She stuck her head around the corner and saw a human man leaning over her counter. She rolled her eyes.

"Don't you ever do your job?" She groused, nearing the man.

"And a bright hello to you too, Boss-Lady." Butler laughed, sliding around the divider. He held out a paper cup of steaming liquid. "How's the day been treating ya?"

"Eh, the usual: krogans with head colds, girls from Afterlife with an itch that they _swear_ came out of nowhere, and a bunch of kids dusting up." She answered, taking a long drag from the cup he had handed her.

"Ooh, fun! Any bodily fluid stories of note today?"

"That's the thing about working here," Shepard answered, "My day hasn't officially started until someone has sneezed, urinated, defecated, projectile vomited or bled on or near me."

"Did you get caught in the line of fire? From that frown, I would bet anything that you got hit. The last kid that walked out here had them red sand withdrawal shakes. Looked like a spew-er." He teased, his dark brown eyes alight with mirth. Shepard leaned in towards him, setting her chin on her upturned palm.

"That one? Nah. Had an aim like a drell assassin." Shepard formed a finger gun with the unoccupied hand and began blasting down imaginary targets with little sound effects.

"Perhaps I should tell her to send her resume to the hanar military." He jested.

"Can't _he_ do anything about it?" Shepard asked, suddenly abandoning the silly banter. Butler frowned, setting down his greasy burger.

"You need to stop doing that. You're killin' yourself going above and beyond as it is. We can't go after every dealer on the station—we topple one down and ten more sprout up to take his place." Butler chastised. She made a face and he continued, "Besides, what's that phrase about people in glass houses?"

She threw the empty paper cup at him, "I think it goes something along the lines of, 'dangerous vigilantes should mind their own business'."

"Speaking of vigilantes, me and the missus wanted to host a get together tonight with some of the boys. What do you say? Free _dinner._ " He stretched the last word out into a sing-song note.

"Sorry, Butts. No dice." Shepard told him.

"But, I got you chai!"

"I'm busy tonight."

"You're full of crap. You never come over anymore." Butler whined, his head cocked. Shepard scrunched her nose up.

"I come over every Saturday after my shift. What are you talking about?"

"Yeah, but that's to be with _Nalah._ " He continued, stressing his wife's name as though it were a curse. She rolled her eyes and cupped his cheek.

"Aww, are you worried that I like Nalah more than I like you?"

"Something like that. When I came knocking on your door, I thought you would be _my_ drinking buddy or something—you know, the John Travolta to my Samuel L Jackson."

"Well… that's cause, I _do_ like her more than you. And, who're you kidding? I'm the Samuel L. Jackson of this duo." She laughed, pinching his cheeks. He grinned at her and shucked her hand away. She turned from him.

"Seriously, though. Why can't you come over tonight? We really are having a bunch of friends over, you should come. _He_ told me that he might come." Butler suggested. She stopped short, but acted as though she had been checking the time. When she saw that it was twenty minutes passed closing, she shucked her coat off onto the nearby chair and collapsed into it.

"You're so full of shit your eyes are brown." She pulled open a drawer and lifted the piece of crap phone out. "And who the hell are you trying to fool? He won't come, he never comes. He doesn't want to see me, otherwise he wouldn't be hiding behind the screen for the past six months."

"C'mon doc, that's not fair and you know it." Butler castigated.

"I know, just let me bitch. I'm frustrated is all. Besides, you only want me over so you can eat Lardo Puffs and gamble without Nalah getting on your case."

"When you're over, she has someone to watch her stupid shows with." He told her. He stood up tall. " _And you're_ avoiding the question. I'll ask for the billionth time, what is it that you're dancing around?" He leaned in. She didn't look at him. Instead, she shifted her eyes as though she was reading her messages.

"I got a contact for some goods that I'm meeting at Afterlife, alright? If you want an Inquisition so badly, go to the arcades and _play it_ there." She joked, scrolling through her messages. Though she was purposefully avoiding her friend's gaze, she couldn't help the smile from spreading across her face as she read the texts from her hidden (yet, stupidly cute) turian.

"Afterlife, eh? What kinda fish are you trying to reel in? I thought that the main Bossman already hooked you up with whatever goodies you needed."

"And not for a second am I ungrateful… But, there are things that he can't get ahold of. Things that I need. If all goes well, I'll hand you all the dirty laundry on a silver platter- provided there's any scraps to pass along." She told him, rubbing her thumb and forefinger together. It was true. Over the course of the last few months, "anonymous" dead drops containing valuable medical equipment practically fell into her lap. Meeting Archangel was not only good for her financially, but for expanding her social network. Apparently, a little bird let Aria catch wind about Shepard's capabilities, which in turn led to one of her men stumbling into her clinic. She assisted the drunk batarian, impressed Aria, and secured herself a cozy little place near Afterlife where even the strongest gangs wouldn't dare mess with her. Not that she saw much of the violence in her earlier clinic, with Butler making not-so-surprising "surprise" visits every week.

"You need someone at your six?" His voice dropped into something deadly serious. She waved her hand at him.

"It ain't like that." She told him dismissively.

"The first sign of trouble…"

"I'll give the little blonde drell assassin trainee a call." She said, a smirk tugging at her lips. Butler backed off.

"Alright, Ems. As long as you got your priorities straight. You going there now or are you going home first? 'Cause I can give you a lift." Butler asked, dumping the paper cups into a black, plastic bin. She patted his arm.

"Thanks but no thanks. It's not a date—I'm not planning on getting cute or anything like that. Oh, and thanks for the chai, by the way. I'll pay you back next week- and I'll come over _twice._ I'll even bring the good wine."

"And your famous mac 'n' cheese?"

"Sure thing. Give Nalah my love tonight—oh! And tell her that she can't watch the next episode of _Tits of a Wonderful Life_ without me."

Butler stopped outside her doorway, "Should I be worried that you religiously watch a softcore porn series with my wife?"

Shepard wiggled her eyebrows, "Very."

He left her clinic with a chuckle and the shake of his head, leaving her to hastily strip out of her work clothes, and into a more inconspicuous uniform: a pair of jeans and an unassuming black hoodie. She stuffed her scrubs into a backpack and shoved it under her desk. She gave Butler a few minutes to leave by answering her messages. If he had any inkling of what she had planned for the night, he would try and stop her- or worse, inform Archangel. They didn't need to worry. She knew what she was doing.

Though she was waiting Butler out, she was not wasting her time. Her correspondence with Archangel had very quickly become her favorite past time. Despite the fact that she not seen hide nor hair of the turian since their initial encounter, hardly a day had passed since she received the phone, that she had not spoken with him. And, while she certainly could not complain about the influx of supplies and big named clients (or, the genuine bond she had developed with Butler and his wife), the most exciting part of the whole deal was her connection to the turian himself. She glanced at the last message he had sent. Cheeky.

 _-[Archangel] 15:33_

 _Any cute, charming princes come to sweep you off your feet yet?_

 _-20:30_

 _Only the 1 that yu forcibly pushed on me…._

 _…and a certain guy that wnt stop txting me. Tht count?_

 _-[Archangel]- 20:30_

 _Butler still there?_

 _(and no, I most certainly would not count myself as cute, charming or a prince)._

 _-20:30_

 _No im afraid he left. Im by my lonesome :,(_

 _(n btw, i disagree)_

 _-[Archangel] 20:31_

 _Need me to crack some heads?_

 _(on which?)_

 _-20:31_

 _Tht isnt necessary. Wht r u up 2 2nite_

 _(d- all of the above)_

 _-[Archangel] 20:31_

 _I had been under the impression that he was throwing some kind of dinner tonight. And, I'd tell you sweetheart, but then I'd have to kill you_

 _(Trying to get me to blush?)_

- _20:31_

 _He is, but like i sed, i got this crazy turian stalker. Cant bring tht 2 the table._

 _(Wood it be bad if i sed that I try 2 do more than tht? ;-) )_

 _-[Archangel] 20:31_

 _I must surely be losing my edge as a menacing, dangerous vigilante if a soft, little human is attempting to get cute with me._

She smiled and held the phone close to her chest. The phone buzzed once more between her fingers and she checked the screen curiously.

 _-[Archangel] 20:32_

 _(And yes, yes it would be bad)_

 _(YOU are very, very, very bad)_

With that, she took a swig from a flask labeled, "Liquid Courage", tucked her phone into her waistband, pulled her jacket's hoodie over her auburn ponytail, and locked up her clinic. When her lights were out and just about every lock she could afford had been set, she glanced at the parking lot and was pleased to see that Butler's skycar was no longer present. She was ready to go. She set out towards her destination. That was the great thing about Omega. Nobody wanted to be seen, which meant that it didn't take much to blend in with the crowd. As she was bathed in the glaring carmine lights of Afterlife, she frowned. She felt guilty for lying to Butler about where she was going. No, Afterlife was too visible, too high-profile. Besides, now that she was under Aria's wing, her cohorts all knew Shepard's face. She shook her guilt off by shoving her hands into the central pocket of her hoodie, where she could thumb the edges of all the letters she had received. That did the trick.

Next to Florida back on Earth, Omega was possibly the shittiest place the Milky Way galaxy had to offer. To be considered vile, even by Omega's standards, spoke volumes about the pub she was entering- and the people who frequented it. Upon entering, she was greeted by a wall of noise: a cacophonous symphony of bass and synth, with pulsating lights blinking to the beat of the music. Thick plumes of smoke had her coughing into her fist as she scanned the dive bar for her contact. Her eyes skimmed over the writhing mass of sweaty bodies at the center of the room. She searched the seated area and found him immediately. She didn't have a name, species or face to base this assumption on, but she didn't need any. She ducked around a pair of sparring krogan and marched towards the table. His large, onyx eyes followed her the entire way there. She stopped only when the grimy table's edge dug into her thigh.

She hurled the offending papers from her pocket and onto the table, as though they had burned her. For all the emotional distress they had caused her over the course of the past few months, they might as well have. The drell glanced momentarily at the papers before returning his attention back upon her. He looked greatly amused.

"I wasn't impressed with your fucking love letters, shithead." She growled ferally. The drell chuckled.

"You know, the word on the street was that Dr. Shepard was the sweetest person on Omega. It is quite a shame that you don't live up to the hype."

"Forgive me if I'm not feeling particularly cuddly right now." She answered curtly.

"Why don't you sit? It looks odd for you to be standing there." The drell advised in his low voice, a hand gesturing to the chair across from him.

"I would prefer to stand, fuck you very much. Now. Let's get down to business. The letters." She barked at him. The drell blew a gust of air out of his mouth that puffed his cheeks out comically. He picked up one of the letters with a scowl, as though it had taken him great effort to do so. Hastily, his eyes scanned the page. Once finished, he tossed it back towards her.

"This was not written by me." He declared. She squinted at him.

"Bull."

"Don't be stupid. If I had sent this, why would I be asking for your assistance?" He tapped the side of his head. "Use your brain. This? This wasn't me."

"What do you mean-" She had screamed this, but he silenced her with a look. Promptly, she grabbed the chair and jerked it beneath her, her emotions causing her movements to be sloppy. She leaned over the table, "You mean to tell me, that some jerkoff has been harassing me for months and you just so _happen_ to email me regarding the exact same thing?"

"With a jackpot like this, are you really so surprised that there are other people seeking the same thing?"

"Don't you dare. Don't you dare talk about him like that. _He_ is not a jackpot. _He_ is not a prize to be won and _I_ don't know why you contacted me because _I_ cannot help you."

"And that, my dear," the drell leered, leaning into her, "is where you're wrong."

"Excuse me, but have you suffered a head injury recently? Is the music too loud? Translator not working?" She hissed, "Because I fail to see where you're comprehension has failed you. _He's dead. He. Is. Dead. Gone. My brother is never coming back."_ She gripped one of the letters and shook it at the smug drell across from her. She blinked awy the tears that threatened to escape. She couldn't show weakness in front of this man. That would be dangerous.

Crumbling between her quivering fingers was the first of the many letters that she had received from the sadistic, anonymous sender. In fact, the paper she held was the very one she had read that night when she had first contacted Archangel. Each time she looked at that scrap of paper, she felt another piece of her being get chipped away. The letters never said much, but they didn't have to. They said only enough to make their point known.

They were all the same- the letters. A picture and a caption. An N7 logo. Charred armor. Waxy skin frozen beneath a layer of ice. Eyes. The exact same color as her own. Lifeless, yet still capable of burning into her soul. Its caption was simple.

 _"Drinking yourself to death won't help you find me."_

"Listen to me, there are cogs. Cogs that are in motion. I have it on good authority that your brother was recovered from Alchera by an interested party. This just reaffirms that fact."

She waited a moment before responding, "You said my brother."

"That I did. What of it?"

"You said my brother, not my brother's corpse. Why did you say that?" Her voice was barely more than a whisper, but she had no doubt that he heard her.

"I told you. There are cogs in motion. Advancements in science are amazing. We can help him, but we need you to play your part. I'm talking about miracles here." He answered, his voice a whisper as well. She scoffed and leaned back.

"Nonsense, complete and utter nonsense is what you're talking about." She scoffed.

"If it wasn't a possibility, then why would I be sitting here?" He countered, "why would someone go as far as to snatch his body?"

She pursed her lips. Without anything to say, she peered at the various letters scattered over the top of the table. She wasn't actually looking at them, but it gave her something to do while she thought. Her fingers were drumming nervously.

"And…" she said slowly, "how exactly do you expect me to talk about this rationally? It's not the weather, where it means nothing. _Cloudy with a 100% chance of my brother's dead body._ John needs to be returned to his family and mourned, not traded around like a fucking baseball card."

The drell didn't say anything. She waited. When he continued to say nothing, she sighed. He had her pinned. How could she ever turn down an offer to be reunited with her brother again? Even if it was just his lifeless body, it was better with her than rotting on Alchera… or worse, with whatever psycho had been torturing her with the letters. The tapping of her fingertips against the table reached a fever pitch and she caved.

"And say I'm willing to entertain the thought of helping you. What will I be doing, exactly?"

"That's not for me to decide. I'm just a pretty face."

"Well, that's certainly subjective." She muttered under her breath.

"Come again?"

"I'll need time to think about this before I commit to anything." She told him, not caring to elaborate on her insult.

"We had a feeling that would be the case." The pale drell took to his feet, straightening the tailored jacket he wore. He shook his finger at her, "But I have no doubt that you'll see the light. We'll be in contact." He went to hand her his business card. When she made no effort to reach for the square of paper, he faltered. He snorted a gust of air and dropped the card on the table, atop one of the letters. He breezed passed her, stopping only to squeeze her petite shoulder. The contact set every hair on her body on edge. A current ripped through her spine and she shivered from the sensation. She sucked in a shuddering breath as a single tear dripped a warm, wet trail down her cheek. He went to leave, but she caught the wrist that lingered on her.

"Why?" She breathed. "Why are you all doing this to him?"

"Keep an ear on the ground and you'll hear more. There are stirrings on the horizon and when it all hits the fan, we both know which Shepard the galaxy will be needing, yes?" He told her. She glared straight ahead of her. He slid his hand out from under hers and left her by herself. A few seconds passed and all she could do was glare at the wall. When she finally broke, she dropped her head into her upturned hands and wrenched the hoodie from her head.

"Dickhead." She cursed under her breath. She was wrong. Omega was _just_ as bad as Florida.

John deserved better than this. What he was due exactly, she was unsure. He was certainly worthy of more than dying at thirty years old and left to rot on some god forsaken frozen planet. But then again, apparently her brother wasn't going to rot. Just like when he was alive, everyone wanted a piece of the great Commander Shepard. Figures. Even in death, he couldn't rest. But, what did they want to do with him? What did they want with _her?_ She was a doctor, and a damn good one if she said so herself. But, you couldn't bring back the dead after this long- no matter how great you were. She didn't even know what sick bastard was in possession of his body.

She felt a buzzing at her hip, but she elected to ignore Archangel. He could wait. If she moved her head, the dizzying emotions roiling within her gut would have her on the floor in an instant. She failed John. Again. And again. She was a failure. Since the moment she heard he had died, she would ask herself, "What I wouldn't give to see him smile, or hear his voice, just one more time?"... yet, now that someone had him, and was doing god knew what with him, all she could think about was how to get him back. Even if meant allying herself with the dregs of society. The pain in her chest was a gaping hole now. She could have confided in Archangel or Butler about all of this. She knew they would listen. But, even after all this time, she could not bring herself to talk about her brother's death. And, even though she _knew_ that it would be cathartic, it was just too painful to bring up those feelings. To anyone, even herself. It was simply easier to find solace at the bottom of a bottle.

Her phone continued to buzz. Then, suddenly. It stopped. But the sensation was soon replaced with another. She felt a tapping on her shoulder and her heart plummeted.


	4. Chapter 4

She turned. Almost unwillingly so. And when she did, she came to the realization at how _desperately_ she had yearned for it to be a towering, inscrutable turian. She came to this realization only after feeling disappointment eat at her as she found herself staring up at a man—human—donned entirely in black armor that obfuscated his identity. Judging from the dirty dish rag he used to clean a mug, she determined this to be the bartender. Her eyes narrowed, and her lips pursed.

"How might I be of assistance?" She asked, attempting to tone down any sharp edges from her voice. However, the weight of the evening had beat an ache in her temples that made it difficult to remain friendly.

"You're cut off." The bartender told her, a voice enhancer in his helmet obscuring his voice as well as his face. Had she been anywhere but Omega, this would have struck her as odd, but abnormality was the new reality here. She found that while the female bartenders continued to dress in sexualized outfits to garner the maximum number of tips, their male counterparts wore armor (lest their patrons take personal offense to being cut-off at closing time and whip out whatever they're packing).

She guffawed, an eyebrow perked, "Care to repeat that?"

"I said, _you're cut off and you should leave._ Now."

"What are you on about? 'Cause…" she twisted slightly to gesture towards the clearly alcohol-free table, "as you can see, there isn't much to cut, now is there?" As sober as it Justicar.

"Maybe you didn't hear me right," the bartender rolled his neck in the thick armor, as though to crack it, but she knew what he was doing. Embedded in the ear of his helmet was a receiver, the same device that Butler always had shoved in his own, "I said you're cut off and _you need to leave, Emma_."

She mouthed a curse and got to her feet. Butler and his wife were the only people on the station that referred to her by her first name, to everyone else, she was Shepard or Doc. If Butler was going this far out of his way to keep his identity secret, there must have been a reason… But what the hell? Why was he pretending to play bartender? It wasn't too long ago that he had been in her office in civilian clothes. Before she responded, her eyes swept the massive pub, as though expecting Archangel to be leaning against the bar and waving at her. Archangel was here, she knew it in her bones, and if he sent Butler to speak with her, that meant he knew that she was here too… but why hide from her? He obviously saw the showdown with the drell. Was he in trouble?

Cautiously, she asked, "Are you acting on behalf of the manager or was it something I did?" Butler paused, and she could hear a buzzing in his headpiece. He was being given orders.

"The manager is insistent I escort you out."

"And the reason he isn't telling me this personally is…" She rolled her wrist impatiently.

"'Cause he got his hands full with some vendors in the back. They wouldn't appreciate being put on hold." He answered. She tried to decipher just what that meant but simply settled for 'he's busy'.

Her sigh was her answer. It wasn't as though she had any more business in the shoddy pub, nor did she wish to linger. She also knew that no matter how much she kicked or screamed, Archangel wouldn't risk exposure meet her out here and escort her out. Butler moved behind her, placing the cup and rag on the table while she stealthily slid the business card into the central pocket.

"What are you doing here?" She whispered. She had learned the art of speaking without moving her lips, and like this, they could whisper without too much worry of being overheard. Butler clicked off the voice enhancer, so it was easier for her to understand when he bent to whisper in her ear.

"This suit is constricting my Bojangles so tight, I feel 'em in my throat and you're asking me why I'm here?" He asked disbelieving. Her head twisted sharply

"Wait, you're going to…. now?" She didn't dare verbally say what she knew was about to happen.

"Yes!"

"Here?" Ah yes, Emma Shepard, asking the hard-hitting questions that would make even Walter Cronkite proud. Yeah, right.

"Durr-hurr. Bossman was the one that caught wind of you. I was too busy playin' my part as the surly bartender to see you come in, but we need you out before the shit hits the fan."

"What happened to the get together you were having tonight?"

"Things like this are quick gigs. This was going to be over in the time it took me to 'go get some Lardo Puffs'. Boss is a good strategist. In. Out. Real quick." This made her shiver. How many parties or dinners had she been to where he had used that phase? She had always attributed the stiffness with which is wife nodded to this statement having to do with her hatred for his poor eating habits. And now that she knew, she wondered how many times had he casually walked out of the house to 'buy' fatty fried batarian food but in all actuality, went to go fight by Archangel's side?

As they approached the entrance of the pub, she was forced from her introspective thoughts by a shrill buzzing in Butler's earpiece that had him freezing up. He murmured something low and impossible to hear as she peered up at him from under furrowed brows. He was staring fixedly at the front door, his grip sliding to tighten about her bicep. He was pulling her backwards.

"Approximately how much shit just hit the fan?" She asked through tight lips. She too was staring at the door.

"Put it to you this way, even a Celiac after Olive Garden would be impressed." Butler answered, the glowing blue eyes of his helmet trained on the door. As he answered, a particularly repulsive batarian and his few flunkies stepped onto the premises and a shift ran through the establishment. It was as though she had been plunked down into one of those classic Wild West movies back on earth where everyone immediately stops to face the newcomer. For a few heartbeats, everyone in the establishment held their breath. The batarian and his cronies walked towards the bar, basking in the attention that their presence had garnered.

Butler had backpedaled the two of them into the corner of the pub, away from the dance floor and the majority of the crowd. The buzzing in his ear had reached a fever pitch and he was responding only in annoyed whispers. "I know— Quit bitchin', I— Don't start. Do not start—NOW? what do you mean now— _Well, butter my ass and call me toast!_ "

Shepard craned her neck upward once more to reward Butler with an amused smirk at his choice of phrasing, but her expression quickly faltered when he bent down to her ear to whisper, "Ems, I'm really, really, _really_ sorry about this."

Before she could even ask: for what? He had used his leverage on her arm to drop her hastily to the floor without so much as a single word of explanation. Thankfully, her outstretched hands managed to catch her before her face slammed against the floor. She wanted to demand an explanation, but the nudging of his boot had her rolling sideways under a nearby table.

Just as realization struck Shepard, the power went out.

The entire building was plunged into complete and utter darkness, much to the dismay of the party-goers who had groaned and heckled that they no longer had music to conduct their business to.

She wished she could have claimed experience made her smarter than this, but the instantaneity of the situation had struck her dumber than pile of garden tools. She should have expected that first bullet, but instead the first _BANG!_ left her ears ringing. Fucking tinnitus. Over the high-pitched shriek that now took residence in her ears, she heard the slump of a body and the consequent upturning of the pub.

In an active shooter situation, the vast majority involved fall within two categories: they either freeze up in terror or they rush the exit. When it came to the primal fight or flight, most people chose flight.

The residents of Omega, well, they were not most people. They did not heed such reasonable thoughts of withdrawal. No, they were the strange sort that, when confronted with an active shooter situation, they made it a group participation effort. This wasn't their first rodeo… or their second… or fourth… Hell, she would put good money down that this wasn't even their tenth shoot-out _this month_ and while she could not _see_ this, she sure could hear it.

The rumble of several nearby tables being upturned and used as makeshift protection made the floor beneath her tremble. She heard more participants withdrawing their concealed weapons and blindly joining the fight. Shepard feared for Butler's safety, but without actual armor or shields to protect her from any stray bullets, she couldn't risk leaving the safety of her makeshift shelter.

Her thoughts raced, her mind zigzagging through the insanity of the situation, with most of the phrases running through her head containing the only phrase that could eloquently describe the situation: what the ever-living fuck?

With the pub plunged into complete darkness, the only way she could approximate the locations of the gunfight's participants was through the brief flashes from the gun's firing. Judging from the proximity of one flashing muzzle, she determined that Butler had remained rooted in a safe spot near her.

A shot not belonging to Butler rang out closer than she expected. The shell hit the table protecting her, forcing it to shatter. A surprised scream was torn from her throat as scraps of metal and cheap wood rained on her forcibly. She scooted backwards, only to have her spine contact the corner walls of the pub. Whoever the aggressor was, they clearly saw her as a threat as she heard monstrous foot steps follow her scuttling. Not waiting for Butler to save her hide, she did the only thing she could think of and hit her omni-tool.

A little combat drone sprung from the orange tool wrapping her wrist and illuminated the krogan that had apparently been bearing down on her. The pestering ball of blue light zapped the attacker in the eyeball, eliciting a (hilarious) girlish shriek from the bipedal dinosaur-like alien. He doubled over, and she kicked upward, aiming her foot for the krogan's knee. The force of her foot against the bone, shot the patella upward and he crumpled forward. From the illumination provided by the drone, she could see Butler sneak behind the bent over the alien. He shot the krogan in a weak point between the plates and the alien ceased all struggling. The shot wasn't clean though. Gobbets of flesh spattered Shepard's face in warm, wet chunks. Butler approached the drone and shot it as well, point blank, causing it to fizz and dissipate with a soft hiss. Apparently, the power outage was a calculated measure.

With that complete, Shepard was amazed to find that the surrounding sounds of the fight had ceased. Just like that, everything was over. Butler hadn't been lying when he mentioned how fast things were generally accomplished. It was as he said: In. Out. Real quick. How the few members of Archangel's team that must have been planted in the pub managed to neutralize the entirety of its patrons (minus the one she selfishly decided to claim as her own with some minor assistance) left her speechless.

"All clear!" a voice on the distal end of the room shouted.

She leaned forward, as though she had night vision that could be used to inspect the room. Unbeknownst to her, she was trembling violently from the anxiety that had been building since the lights had first been doused and the movement pitched her forward onto her chest. She heard Butler close the distance and lifted her by the arm. She shakily got to her feet, but she didn't trust her knees not to give way.

"Still got all of your bits and pieces?" He teased, allowing her to clutch at his arm as though it were a life-line. He flipped the visor's lights on and it provided a frame of reference for his location, though it did nothing to shed light on the surrounding area. Before answering, she took stock of herself, feeling along her torso, not relying on her brain to provide the answer. She breathed a sigh of relief. While it would be a lie to claim to be 100%, she certainly wasn't physically injured. Around her, she could hear the crunching of several boots, the distinctive sliding of something heavy and the hissing of heat sinks being ejected from barrels.

"I think so," She answered, somewhat breathlessly. She felt his hand swipe down her face, attempting to wash away the hunks of krogan the were sliding down her chin, but instead, he smeared it into her face, only making matters worse.

"You look like you were just in a bukkake." Butler told her. She felt her nose wrinkle and she swatted his hand away with minor irritation.

"You're so vile," she chastised, using the hem of her shirt to finish what Butler had attempted to start.

"Good thing all that doctor stuff got ya' used to being acquainted with blood and guts." He commented. She brushed table debris from her shirt.

"Oh, yes, always good to put my degree to use." She commented dryly, using sarcasm to disguise her fright. She attempted to push away from Butler's frame and she found herself stumbling. Butler, always the one that had her back, caught her before she contacted the floor for a second time that night, however, now she couldn't pretend as though everything was still hunky-dory.

"OI! Krul, get off your fat ass and bring me that shit you use to wake people up, so I can get her out of here!" Butler shouted over her head.

"Don't get your panties in a twist." A very gruff, very _krogan_ voice called out, "and don't call me fat, meat sack."

"Don't call me meat sack, ya' ugly dinosaur."

"Don't—"

"Would the two of you kindly shut the fuck up? I'm trying to count how many Blue Suns we got bagged and you idiots are making me lose my focus." A female voice barked. Shepard vaguely recognized the voice. It belonged to an asari in Archangel's squad and if her memory served her correctly, she was Mielen, former C-Sec. Shepard had pulled a fair share of bullets from the matron-staged asari and she was just as surly with the doctor as she had been with the boys.

The krogan known as Krul was now next to her, mimicking the female's haughty tone childishly under his breath, much to Butler's amusement. Butler shuffled her wavering body to grasp whatever Krul the krogan was handing him.

She heard a snap, a flapping sound and then felt Butler reach over to wave something beneath her nose that reeked of ammonia. She sputtered, coughing as the lining of her nose and throat were assaulted with what felt like fire. She jerked away from Butler, suddenly very capable of standing without support.

"Sweet baby Jesus, what the hell?" She coughed into her fist, "Were those smelling salts?" Though the smelling salts had snapped her into focus, she was still uncomfortable parting with Butler, lest she risk falling or worse, tripping over a body (and subsequently falling on _that_ instead). She felt for his shoulder. He placed a hand calmly over her own.

"Ammonium carbonate," Krul explained, his voice taking an entertained tone, "kicks like a varren, doesn't it?"

She nodded, her thumb and forefinger pinching her nostrils shut in an effort to alleviate the burning, "You could say that again."

"We got a positive ID on Mirki'it!" A flanged voice nearby interrupted, "Vitals are strong. What do you want me to do?" There was a pause, a door opened, and a pair of footsteps clunked into the room.

"You leave Mirki'it to me. I need an ID on everyone here and their inventory. In the meantime…"

Her stomach tightened. It was Archangel. His footsteps approached them.

"Can you get Nalah to pick her up at Afterlife?" Archangel asked.

"Sure thing, Boss." Butler answered, his tone as formal as the first time she had met him. In any other situation, she would have ribbed the human for the sudden formality, but now the words died before they could form. He began escorting Shepard haphazardly across the floor and her mouth suddenly felt very dry.

What exactly do you say to the most wanted turian vigilante that you've been flirting with for months?

Apparently, not much. As Butler had her stumble blindly forward, a three-fingered hand caught her own. Butler paused, allowing time for Archangel to speak to her.

And it felt like time had stopped.

"Are you hurt?" He asked, his voice serious. She found herself nodding, like an idiot.

"No, no, I'm all in one piece." She answered.

She was sure he was going to say something else, but they were interrupted by Mielen once again.

"Sir, we have incoming hostiles." She reported dutifully. Archangel's hand jerked away from hers as though she were something painfully hot.

"Get her out of here, now. You know the rules. No civilians." Archangel ordered, that perfectly manufactured leader voice sliding back into place.

"Yessir," Butler answered, pulling Shepard away. She fought the insatiable urge to reach out, to touch, to reinforce the fact that he was _right there_.

Sadly, her resolve won, and she allowed Butler to tug her away. Going, going, gone. They went through a set of double doors and he locked them tight. Using the flashlight on his rifle, he directed a path down a plainly adorned hallway. They walked the length in silence. Butler, for once, was rendered speechless and Shepard was too shell-shocked and embarrassed to string together a coherent sentence. It was Butler who broke the silence first.

"I know you hate bein' told what to do—and you know I wouldn't say this if I didn't have to, but go straight to Afterlife, absolutely no detours. I'll have Nalah meet you there and she can take you home." Butler ordered, his tone gentle.

"You and I are going to have to talk about this." She informed him.

"That we are." He answered with a nod. She admittedly did not know what to think or feel. Her mind hadn't quite digested the events of the evening. She felt like she should have been irked by all the lies and secrecy that surrounded Butler, Archangel and the whole vigilante business… but it was a life she had willingly chosen to become a part of (if only on the outer fringes).

"So, this is what happens when you go out for Lardo Puffs, huh?" She asked. She could see the tension lessen in Butler's shoulders.

"Not every time but… frequently enough. We didn't want you worryin' or nothin' like that."

"And it's always like this?" She asked, jerking a thumb over his shoulder. She watched him flick his earpiece off. He didn't want to be overheard.

"Something like that. We've learned that if you hit 'em where it hurts: shipments, money, slaves, drugs, what have ya' and you leave just enough evidence, they get angry enough to overlook red flags. After that, it's easy. Infiltrate an area, prepare a kill zone, hit the lights so they can't identify what's what and BAM! You take down the bad guy without worryin' about civvies eating bullets."

"And what if an innocent person wanders in at the wrong place at the wrong time?" She asked, gesturing towards herself. Butler ran a hand over the top of his head, as though to run his fingers through his hair, but the helmet got in the way. Old habits die hard.

"Generally, we pay a bouncer, or whoever mans the front, to only allow targets in. Boss was real mad when he saw that you had gotten through, but we didn't want to risk drawing attention to you or us." Butler opened the emergency exit and she could see the neon tinted alleyway that it had led to. She leaned her head against the doorframe.

"You know, I'm a big girl. You didn't have to lie about all this." She told him.

"Neither did you." He retorted. She stepped out the doorway.

"Point well made." She capitulated.

He pointed a finger at her and leaned in, "I wasn't kidding when I said I want you to head straight to Afterlife. Absolutely no meeting weird, Matrix-inspired frog-men on the way."

Shepard held up three fingers dutifully, "Scout's honor."

"That's my girl." He answered, and she could practically see the smile spreading across his face.

"You wish."

"Damn right. Now go, before the next act begins." He commanded, shutting the door firmly behind him. She placed her ear against the metal. She could hear his clunking footsteps clang heavily against the floor as he ran back into the other room. On her uneventful trek back to Afterlife, she rubbed at her chin though no more krogan flesh had lingered there and reflected what had happened leading up to now.

When the crimson glow of Afterlife came into view, Shepard was surprised to find that she felt a weight she didn't know she had been carrying lift from her chest. God, she had gotten soft. She got in the crossfire of one firefight and she had her tail between her legs. What would the past Shepard think of her now?

She turned a corner, and at the end of the block was a jet black skycar which was parked just outside the crowded steps leading into the club. Shepard meandered passed the elcor bouncer, who was in yet another argument with a patron that had been waiting in line. She rolled her eyes, sometimes she wondered if he had encouraged the arguments just to have something pass the time. When she approached the skycar, a window rolled down. She lingered on the outside, shifting her weight onto her elbows.

"How's the Chubby?" Shepard asked, leaning her head in. The dark-haired woman inside answered only with a mild shrug, the tips of her fingers tracing the growing swell in her belly.

"Apparently, pretending that all of my organs are soccer balls. I would say she's being a pain in the ass, but the discomfort's a little north of that."

"OB-GYN wasn't my forte, but if I remember right, once the suckers find a position they like, they're really tricky to move." Shepard advised, donning the doctor persona like a comfortable sweater. This made her feel better, however, to Nalah, this was terrible news. She blew a gust of air upwards angrily.

"Isn't that peachy keen?" Nalah moaned. After a second, her expression softened, and she cocked her head sympathetically, "And you? Geoff mentioned that tonight was… rough."

"Any rougher and you'll have to peel me off the pavement." She answered, her tone sour. Nalah's smile turned sad.

"I'm sorry, love. Do you want to talk about all this?" Nalah's voice was soothing, the words gentle enough to put even the crankiest of vorcha into a good mood.

"No… yes… maybe... fuck! I don't know." Shepard breathed as she scrubbed her hand down her face.

Nalah patted the passenger seat with a tan, delicate hand, "Hop in. We can either talk, or not talk, about it over some food."

This slapped a smile on Shepard's face, "I don't know how you do it, but you always manage to say the right thing."

Shepard pushed away from the window, her hand on the latch to lift the skycar's door when she heard hurried footsteps headed for her location. Just as she was preparing to open the door, the sound of her name pulled her attention.

"Doctor Shepard! Doctor Shepard!" A batarian shouted at her. Shepard didn't look up instantly. Instead she made a big show of pinching the bridge of her nose while her eyes squeezed shut.

"I'll need you to peel me off the pavement now," She whispered testily into the car before spinning on her heel to face the newcomer. "Garka, what's the word?"

The batarian stopped short, an uncomfortable distance away from Shepard. For just an instant, he took a moment to huff and puff as though the short jog from the entrance of Afterlife to the spot where he now stood had been 500 miles rather than a measly 500 feet. In lieu of words, he jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

"Aria's waiting for you. It's urgent."

'Is someone hurt?" She asked slowly, attempting to hide the disappointment in her voice. Aria was the last person she wanted to see tonight.

"Listen, that's just between you and Aria. I just deliver the messages."

"Alright, well my ride has to come with me inside."

"Aria hates entourages."

"Aria will have to deal with it," Shepard asserted, her finger pointing inside the car, "She's pregnant."

He eyed her suspiciously, even his resolve weakened at this fact, "How pregnant?"

"Thirty weeks."

"I don't know what that means." He answered, confusion blatantly scrawled across his face. Shepard wasn't amused.

"It means I'm not going to let her sit in a car while I go talk to Aria."

"She won't be happy about this…"

"Then let her be unhappy. Nalah, would you mind coming inside Afterlife with me?" Shepard asked. It was a sticky situation. On the one hand, Shepard yearned to listen to Butler's advice and just head home. On the other hand, one doesn't live on Omega and just ignore Aria. Not if you wanted to live, anyway.

Nalah shrugged, "What Aria wants, Aria gets."

Shepard walked around to the other side of the vehicle and assisted her friend out of the uncomfortably low car. Nalah had reached the stage in her pregnancy where she did what Butler referred to as, "the Pregnant Penguin Waddle". Though the baby wasn't quite ready to pop, it sat low on Nalah's petite frame.

Garka marched them passed the line into the club, much to the dismay of the human that was still arguing with the bouncer. For the second time that night, Shepard was assaulted with the rhythmic pounding of synth and bass that reverberated in the bones of her chest as she entered Afterlife. The eerie crimson light bathed the two women in red, and Shepard was beginning to wonder if Aria chose the color as a metaphor for Omega.

Shepard knew the staff. The turian bartender jerked his chin in acknowledgment. The asari stripper closest to him made a point not to look Shepard in the eyes. They both knew why. Rather than the usual skin-show on the center stage, there was a troupe of hanar, all attempting to juggle with varying ranges of success. One of the performers, despite having six limbs, managed to drop every ball that he tossed in the air—much to the great amusement of the inebriated crowd.

Slowly, they climbed the stairs flanking Aria's protected lair. The closer they got, the more uncomfortable Nalah grew. In that instant, Shepard realized that Nalah saw Aria as the enemy, a classic mixture of neutral and chaotic evil that posed a threat to everything Nalah held dear.

As always, Aria was seated on her leather throne. Her subjects, several aliens with large guns and a gaggle of strippers lounged loyally about her. Upon seeing the doctor, Aria made a flicking motion with her hand and the majority of her smitten worshippers scrambled to make themselves scarce. Aria held her hand towards an adjacent cushion. The two women sat promptly.

At first, Aria didn't look at either of them. "Nice of you to show up, Shepard."

"Always a pleasure." Shepard lied. Aria's head snapped towards her.

"We have a problem."


	5. Chapter 5

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: I just want to apologize for not being a very responsive writer and thank everyone that has taken the time to read/review my story! I promise you all, I read every single comment over and over, but 's way of answering comments is so strange to me! Thank you all for following me this long, you guys are absolutely awesome!**

* * *

Aria often haphazardly tossed around the word 'we' when she meant "she". When Shepard seated herself on Aria's couch only for Aria to say that _they_ had a problem, Shepard wasn't impressed—

though she didn't say this aloud. Instead, she kept her lips sealed, waiting for Aria to explain herself.

Aria got to her feet, pacing.

"Not too long ago, I received word that an unknown disease had started to spread in a small corner of the Gozu district. I didn't want it spreading, so I ordered a quarantine. Nobody in, nobody out."

Shepard felt her eyebrows furrow, "I have friends in the Gozu district, how come I didn't hear anything about this before?" Beside her, Nalah shifted forward slightly. It was apparent that this was news that she was planning on passing along to her husband.

Aria's back was to Shepard at this point in her pacing, and her head snapped feverishly in Shepard's direction to answer, "I wanted this kept quiet and my men are the best at their jobs. You would do well to remember that." She closed the distance between the two of them, until she was in danger of collapsing into Shepard's lap. "The plan was to ride it out—let either the Blue Suns or the disease kill everyone before it became a thing."

"And it never crossed your mind to inform me about this before now? The Gozu District's one of the most densely populated parts of the station, it can turn a minor disease into—"

Aria cut her off, a wave of her slender blue hand coming close to slicing up Shepard's cheek, "It was a risk I couldn't take. It was deadly, and I was going to risk you to take care of it. It would have been easier if the Suns or the sick just did themselves in and left nothing but a memory of this shit."

Shepard's mouth thinned into a grim line. She wasn't stupid enough to be flattered by what Aria said. Shepard was a gleaming bauble that Aria enjoyed possessing, had she been less valuable, Aria would have tossed her to the wolves and left her to her own devices. Shepard placed herself within the likes of Aria's other 'pet', the Patriarch: a trophy for Aria to show off. Archangel urged Shepard that it was better this way, that Aria could offer evident protection that he wouldn't dare risk. Shepard disagreed.

"What changed?" Was all Shepard managed.

Aria backed up now, choosing to seat herself back on her leather throne. She held up two fingers. "Two key pieces of the puzzle came into play. The first, the disease affects everyone but vorcha and humans…"

"And the second?" Shepard urged insistently, when Aria had taken yet another dramatic pause. Shepard silently wondered if Aria could ever win an award for her melodramatic performances.

This next part seemed difficult for Aria to say, "One of my top men caught it. He had never been even remotely close to the quarantine zone. It's been two days and he's already coughing blood. You need to take care of it."

"Where is he? Did you try scanning him?" Shepard asked.

This annoyed Aria, "I told you. It's an unknown disease, if a scan could have picked it up, it would have to begin with."

"Alright, alright, I understand. Where is he now? I can take a look…" Shepard offered placatingly. She seriously doubted a mysterious disease had taken over. The chances of someone catching a disease that could cross species within such a brief period of time were near impossible. Just having a germ jump a single species is extraordinarily rare, for several species to be affected all at once—it must be something rare that Aria was not well acquainted with. Thankfully, she had taken a Cross-Species Pathology course back at school and knew how to go about the situation.

"No, you will look at him tomorrow. I need you at your best for something like this." Aria answered dismissively.

This seeded the first niggle of doubt in Shepard's gut, "If this really is as bad as you say, then I am not your man for this. You'll want Mordin."

"If I wanted _Mordin's_ help, then it would be _him_ sitting on my couch, not you." Aria snapped, her eyes flashing viciously. She got back to her feet, and this took Shepard aback. She had never seen the queen this agitated. "I'll be honest: I don't like this Shepard. Something isn't right, and I want this taken care of. I understand that you and the him are… friends" She said the word as though the notion of friendship was too sickeningly sweet for her to say, "So ask for his help if you must—but remember, you report to me."

As an afterthought, Aria added, "I will provide whatever you need to get the job done, regardless."

Shepard sighed, this was going to be an adventure, "Alright. Just let me know what I'm looking at." She was eager to say anything to get out of the cramped space. Aria was unnerved, and if Shepard bore witness to yet another circuit of anxious pacing, she would tear her hair out.

"I don't know anything about this shit. You're the doctor. Some sort of lung thing. All I know is that it acts quick. You start with a sore throat, then a cough, then you start bringing up blood. Two weeks later, your deader than a salarian scientist on Tuchanka."

"I'm assuming this is your way of telling me that I don't have any time to waste."

Aria paused in her pacing to give Shepard a knowing smirk, "Very astute."

Shepard got to her feet, "Will this be all?"

Aria nodded, her hands clasped stiffly behind her back. "Yes. I will be sending a skycar to your apartment first thing in the morning. I expect you to be prepared by then."

"You'll be sending me all your data on this?" Shepard asked.

Aria nodded again, "You'll have everything that I know by the time your reach your companion's car." She jerked her chin towards Nalah, who stiffened momentarily at her mention. If Nalah thought she could blend into the furniture and out of Aria's notice, then she was dead wrong. There was very little that went unnoticed by the Queen of Omega.

"Okay then, Aria. I'll be seeing you."

"Yes, you will." Aria said, staring deep into Shepard's eyes before allowing her to pass. Nalah got to her feet and followed Shepard down the stairs. The two walked out of Afterlife without a single word passing between them, lest one of Aria's many eyes and ears overheard them. They maintained their silence until they had crossed the threshold, passed the bouncer (who was dealing with another irate customer) and situated within Nalah's parked car.

"What the _hell_ was that about?" Nalah asked, at last.

Shepard took her time getting her seatbelt on. Her omnitool pinged, the massive file that Aria had promised had already finished downloading and was waiting for Shepard to read. Great.

"You know? I have absolutely no idea." Shepard answered. She opened the file and flicked through it quickly, scanning the major bits of information. If she was forced to give Aria a compliment, it was that Aria's leadership here was well-earned. She was tough, maniacal, and more than a little paranoid… but, Shepard would be damned if she said the asari didn't have exceptional organization skills.

"If this Solus guy is her best bet, why ask you? Do you even know how you would go about finding a cure for this… whatever this thing is?" Nalah asked. She had started the engine, but didn't take off. Shepard was running a finger over her bottom lip, her eyes feverishly scanning the information displayed on her wrist.

"You guys must not have crossed paths with Mordin yet." She answered absentmindedly.

"No, we haven't. But, what does that have to do with anything?"

"We humans make pretty good doctors. Salarians, however, rarely forget even the smallest fact. They're very intellectually endowed and make _great_ doctors. Mordin though, he's not just great. He's the best. Nuttier than squirrel shit, but brilliant."

"Alright, well that just makes me wonder even more."

Shepard looked up, "Mordin's a scientist, but he's also ex-STG. _I_ don't come with any strings attached. That works better for Aria's power plays. If she calls, she knows I'll come. Only I know that Archangel provides me undercover protection, Aria's protection is public, and she knows I need it. Mordin can and will fight back. She wouldn't lower her ego enough to ask for his help."

"So, what does this mean for you?" Nalah asked, placing a hand on Shepard's thigh. She could feel Nalah's protective warmth soak through the fabric of her pants and she leaned her temple against the skycar's cool glass window.

"That's the million-dollar question, now isn't it?" Shepard answered. She would have tried to help the plague victims regardless of Aria's intervention… but, now one of Aria's men were affected and Shepard had a ticking time bomb going off on her head. She doubted that Aria was hot-headed enough to kill Shepard if she failed to save the man… but, she wasn't under any impression that Aria would hesitate to skin her hide (both figuratively and literally).

The hand around her thigh squeezed and it pulled Shepard out of her thoughts, "You're not alone."

Shepard smiled, covering Nalah's tanned hand with her own pale one, "I know. Thank you for everything, Nalah." She looked up for a moment and then followed up thoughtfully with, "I'm going to forward everything to Mordin now."

"Do you want to call him and tell him what's going on?" Nalah asked, but Shepard shook her head and the smile grew comical.

"I don't know how to say this… but, with Mordin… sometimes it's best you let that little salarian brain run its course." She laughed. She sent the files without a second thought.

"And what about Archangel?" She asked. She had pulled her hand out from under Shepard's and was beginning to drive the car upwards. Shepard leaned her forehead against the window and she felt her stomach lurch. Yes, what about Archangel?

"Him, too. I… I think I need to tell him everything before anything else." She rolled her head to the side, "I don't mean to sound ungrateful. I just don't know how much shit I'm sinking into. I don't want you to get dragged along."

Nalah's eyes rolled and she groaned dramatically, "Ugh! You've been spending too much time with my husband. You're starting to talk like him!" This made Shepard laugh and for a bit, the two of them sat in companionable silence as Nalah drove. When they reached a stoplight, Nalah's face fell.

"What?" Shepard asked worriedly, looking about the car as if expecting something nefarious to be waiting outside for them.

"I was going to head over to the Wacky Tentacle before taking you home, but then I remembered, that's in the Gozu District—where the plague is."

"The plague doesn't effect humans and the outbreak is pretty much contained to the opposite side of the district." Shepard reminded her, "But if you want to go somewhere else, there's a new pyjak café that opened in the Fumi District that I wanted to try. All proceeds go to the local adoption agency."

Nalah made a face, "I've been craving that place since you introduced me to it. If we don't go, I'm going to explode."

"If it's any consolation, there are weirder things to crave while pregnant." Shepard consoled.

"Oh, don't get me started on weird cravings." Nalah stated knowingly. Shepard noted that she was continuing to drive in the direction of the Wacky Tentacle, despite her earlier misgivings. Had Shepard been concerned that baby could somehow be potentially affected by the disease, she would have spoken.

"What kind of cravings have you been having?" Shepard asked, a grin plastered on.

"I don't want to talk about it!" Nalah exclaimed, embarrassed.

"C'mooooooooon!" Shepard urged, poking Nalah's cheek obnoxiously with each syllable, "tell me!"

"I _don't_ want to talk about it!" Nalah repeated, her cheeks blooming a rosy pink, but she wasn't taking the harassment to heart: Shepard could see her attempting to suppress a smile.

"If you don't tell me, I'm going to ask Butler and he's going to tell a way more embarrassing version." Shepard pestered.

Nalah said something, so quick and low that Shepard didn't believe it at first.

"Did I just hear you say, 'cookies soaked in pickle juice and then dipped in mayonnaise'?" Shepard sputtered. Nalah rolled her lips into her mouth, too ashamed to neither confirm or deny the question. Shepard laughed again and Nalah play-hit her arm.

"It's not funny! You quit laughing or I'll hold you down and make you try it!" Nalah threatened, but she was laughing now, the blush fading. Shepard continued chuckling.

"No offense, but that sounds just as appetizing as licking the toe-jam from a batarian's foot." Shepard said between giggles. Nalah crinkled her dainty nose and spared a glance at her from the road.

"I know, it's so gross isn't it? In my head, I know it's a terrible combination, but just thinking about it is making my mouth water." Nalah explained. They were nearing the restaurant. Shepard occasionally forgot how quick transportation was when she didn't have to use the public trains.

As Nalah flicked on the blinkers to alert the drivers behind her that she was planning on descending, Shepard asked, "So… what kind of cookies?"

Nalah settled into a parking space near the restaurant. Her eyes flicked over to Shepard as she answered, "Mississippi Mud Pie Oreos."

Shepard nodded her head sagely, a solemn expression on her face, "Ah, yes, of course. That explains everything."

The two of them looked at each other for just a second before bursting out laughing. Nalah turned off the car and shook her head.

"Ass." She accused. Shepard didn't argue.

Outside of the glowing neon lights of the Wacky Tentacle with Nalah, Shepard could pretend that everything was going smoothly. She could pretend that her brother wasn't dead and being fought over like a piece of meat. She could pretend like she hadn't just been smack dab in the middle of a firefight and nearly died this evening at the hands of some nameless krogan. She could pretend that Aria wasn't holding a knife to her throat while a plague ravaged the aliens in that one secluded section of the Gozu district.

She could also pretend that she didn't bump into Archangel tonight.

Upon entering the premises, a bell chimed. It alerted Boran Cal who looked up from what Shepard knew was a Fornax magazine hidden behind an intergalactic Forbes knock-off (just in case Talia inspected). He gave a cheerful wave hello and twisted on his stepstool to shout the order without being prompted.

"Two number eights, light onion, extra Wacky Sauce and a number three!" Boran called out. Somewhere from the depths of the kitchen, Bev shouted her welcome and the two women took their seats in a shabby booth nearest the front door.

Nalah leaned forward, her voice the barest of whispers, "I hate to bring this up again, but _he_ needs to know what's going on. I don't know why, but something about all this-it rubs me the wrong way."

Shepard waited to answer as Boran Cal waddled over to place two glasses of water on their table. When he nestled himself back into the pages of his porn, Shepard tapped the straw against the table and popped the plastic from the paper casing. She took a long sip, looking thoughtful for a moment.

Nalah was right, but she didn't know how right she was. She was going to have to spill the beans—about the plague, about the drell tonight, about John and through the truth about her brother, she was going to have to reveal a lot about herself. Shepard looked down for a second, and in a moment of rage, she banged a closed fist against the table, causing both of their cups to rattle against the fake wood.

Nalah placed a hand on Shepard's wrist, "They say: when it rains, it pours."

Shepard didn't look up, "Where's an umbrella when you need it?"

"We're all here." Nalah cooed in a soothing voice. This made Shepard smile and swelling emotions had her throat tighten. She wanted to express her gratitude, but before she could answer, Talia burst through the double doors. She had managed to balance two bowls of soup between her arm and her torso whilst holding a plate of food in the other arm. If the asari chef had been expending any effort in making sure that the food didn't slosh out of place, she did a fantastic job at concealing it. She placed the plate down on a table near the kitchen and brought the two bowls of soup to Shepard and Nalah.

"Hello, Shepard." She greeted in an airy voice. Her tone caused Shepard to tear her gaze away from her food (though that was easier said than done). The asari, who was normally beautifully composed, appeared off. Her normally deep azure skin seemed faintly pale.

Shepard snagged her attention before she wandered back into the kitchen, "Talia, don't take this the wrong way, but are you alright?" Her voice was filled with concern.

"Huh? What?" She asked before coughing a wheezing sound into the palm of her hand. In the time it took for her to cough, she realized the basis for Shepard's question and smiled gently, "Nothing ever escapes your notice, doctor, but I'm fine. The restaurant has been busier than ever, and Bev's been considering expanding. The stress of it all has been catching up to me."

Shepard clapped her hands together, "Oh, Talia! That's so great to hear! I'm so happy for you both, just make sure you're taking care of yourself. I heard there's some sickness that hit the Gozu district, I was worried you had caught it."

Talia placed a hand on her chest, "Oh, goddess, can this place ever go one day without falling apart? Thank you, doc, I'm just hoping we can handle all the growth." She rubbed her eye with the heel of her palm, "It's such a hassle."

"Don't say that. If anyone deserves to do well, it's you guys. Like I said, just make sure you take care of yourself. Stress will wreak havoc on your body."

"I believe that is easier said than done." Talia stated wistfully.

Shepard capitulated, "Too true. Let me know if and when you open up a new store."

"Of course," Talia answered. She bowed her head and excused herself. Shepard began shoveling the food into her mouth and watched Talia disappear into the kitchen. Once she was gone sight, Shepard dropped her spoon into the bowl with a soft _clink_.

"Can I ask you something?" Shepard asked quietly.

Nalah nodded, "Go ahead."

"Feel free to tell me to take my nose out of your business if I'm prying, but what are you planning on doing when this baby's born? Is Butler going to continue 'working' here?"

Nalah leaned back, her face darkening, "I want to leave—raise her back on Earth where she can feel the sun on her skin, the four seasons, see her grandparents—have a chance at being a normal kid."

"I'm taking it your husband doesn't feel the same way?"

"No," Nalah's nose scrunched, "he doesn't. Geoff loves what he does. He can't imagine going back to just being a cop."

"And uhh…?" Shepard was afraid to say his name out loud. Thankfully, Nalah knew where she was going.

"He said that he agrees with me, but doesn't want to push the matter one way or another." She answered.

At that moment, a buzzing against Shepard's hip sent her jumping up towards the ceiling. With a yip of surprise, she pulled the phone out of her pocket and recognized the number. Her stomach curdled. She wasn't ready to tell him about John. She knew she had to and ready-or-not, he was calling now.

"It's _him_!" She hissed, holding the phone out for Nalah's inspection.

"Pick it up!" Nalah encouraged in a reasonable tone. It stood in stark contrast to Shepard's voice.

"But I didn't have time to rehearse what I was going to say to him!"

"What's there to rehearse?"

"I don't know! Everything? He's never called me before."

"Emma, if you don't put on your big girl panties and act like an adult…"

Shepard made a frustrated noise in the back of her throat, " _But!"_

SPLAT!

Nalah had used her spoon as a mini-trebuchet and launched a massive, slimy chunk of asari dumpling smack-dab between Shepard's eyes. With a no-nonsense expression, she handed Shepard the keys to her car.

"Take a deep breath, go to my car and just _talk_. I know you're nervous about whatever's going on, but you got this."

Shepard took the keys and bowed her head, "Thank you, I needed that."

Nalah shooed her out with the flapping of her wrist, "Don't thank me—go!" Shepard nodded, scurrying out of the restaurant and into the car in record timing.

When she pressed the accept call prompt on the screen, her stomach did yet another flip-flop.

"Emma?"

"I'm here."

There was a pause and for a desperate second, she swore they had disconnected.

"Hi."

This forced a nervous chuckle from her lips, "Hi."

"Were you hurt tonight?"

"You already asked that, try again." She answered with a smile.

"Just trying to be thorough."

"I know. I had a close call during the fight, but I- quite literally- made it out of there without a scratch."

She heard him hum his approval, "Good. Now, what were you doing there?"

"No, no, no. You asked one question, now it's my turn."

"Are you really going to play this game?" He asked, but she noted he didn't sound annoyed. He was amused. That was a comforting sign.

"Darn Skippy."

"Alright, then. Let's hear it."

She took a deep breath, this was it, the big enchilada, the moment of truth. She had to psyche herself up to ask him:

"Did you ever meet a human by the name of John Shepard?"


	6. Chapter 6

_Swaddled in the pristine white of her crisp lab coat, stethoscope artfully draped about her shoulders, doctor Emma Shepard was on top of the world. On her chest, the ID badge with her grinning face was a medal of honor—a memorial to the blood, sweat, and tears that got her to the place she was today. Her days in the A &E level of Huerta Memorial were the most stressful yet rewarding ones of her entire life. Smiling proudly into the remaining dregs of her fat-free, plain yogurt, she rifled through patient charts and watched the local news. Situated on the plastic chair in the break room, she felt like a queen, and her good cheer radiated about her like the rays from the sun. _

_"A miracle—that is the only to describe the events that occurred this afternoon in the Zakera Ward. A young human male rescued two asari, after an attempted—and nearly successful—kidnapping by known slaver, Kohl Dorl. We bring you live to Emily Wong in the field—Emily?"_

 _The screen cut to a beautiful woman positioned perfectly before a crime scene. Behind her, lights flashed, and C-Sec swarmed like a hive of angry ants. To her left was a teenaged boy whose sandy blonde dreadlocks were piled high onto the top of his head, held precariously in place with a green rubber band. His pale face would have been attractive, had it not been for the numerous pockmarks that marred the skin and left a sea of craters across his cheeks._

 _"Yes, Tom. I'm here." She answered sweetly._

 _"Can you tell us what happened?"_

 _"Well, I'm standing on the 633 Block, outside the HubCapsule. C-Sec believes that most transients consider this place a refuge. Beside me is the hero of the hour, eighteen-year-old Rylie Holmes. Rylie, can you please give us your account of the events that took place?"_

 _The youth, clearly startled by his own celebrity status, blinked with obvious bewilderment into the camera. He tucked an errant dread behind his ear, "Uh, yeah, sure, Emily. So, I'm uh, Rylie Holmes and like, I was just skating along the 633 here, you know—minding my own business or whatever and I saw this batarian dude acting kinda sus."_

 _"Sus?" Emily elaborated._

 _"Oh, uh, I mean suspicious. Dude was acting fishy. He was walking down the street with these two babes, and I watched them go because I was all like, 'how did that ugly hot dog wienie get two hotties like that?'" Anyway, I was going to just keep going, but something didn't feel right, and I saw that one of the two birds looked all scared and sh[BLEEP]."_

 _"What happened next?" Wong probed._

 _"So, I approached them, you know, all friendly-like and pretended that I needed directions. Well, this dude was having none of it and began threatening me. So, I'm all like, "Hey man, what's your beef? I'm just looking to grab a bite, why you gotta be like that?' and get this—he swung at me. He actually swung at me—for nothin'! So, I took my board," Rylie raised what appeared to be a battered piece of blood speckled wood up to the camera, "and just SUH-MASHED this dude in the face. The two girls ran away, and we continued to go at it. I was just like: BAM! BAM! BOOOOOOOOOOooooooooOOOOOOM!" Rylie began to dramatically reenact the scene, raising the shattered wood above his head to recreate the scenario._

 _"When everything finished, a bunch of folks began to crowd me, and the girls ended up coming back. After that, C-Sec came over and they like, did that interview thing. When I was done, the pig—I mean, the cop told me that I had actually fought with this like, really famous slaver, that they'd been trying to catch, and that the chicks were some girls from Chora's den that he was planning on selling back on Kar'Shan."_

 _"How does it feel knowing you just single-handedly rescued two women from a life of sexual slavery?"_

 _"It's pretty gnarly, I guess." The teen answered with a shrug._

 _"And what now? What lies on the horizon for Rylie Holmes?"_

 _With the sly smile of a cat before it takes a bite out of the canary, Rylie looked into the camera and said, "Gonna go try and get a date out of one of those chicks."_

 _Whoever the cameraman was, he clearly had a sense of humor—for he zoomed in on the look of utter bewilderment plainly scrawled across the normally poised journalist's face. She stared at the camera with the sort of pleading expression that begged for someone to explain that it was all a joke. A bubble of laughter escaped Emma's lips at this._

 _The footage was then cut short and the show went back to the talking heads in the studio. At that moment, their faces were painted with the gravest of expressions._

 _The man, Tom, now stared seriously at the camera, "Thank you, Emily. We are currently receiving breaking news from the Alliance military, regarding the first human Spectre, Commander John Shepard and his ship, the SSV Normandy. Let's go to Khalisah Bint Sinan Al-Jilani, who's currently outside the Alliance office in the Presidium."_

"What exactly do you know?" The voice on the other end of the line demanded. Vague. He was defensive, but the question neither confirmed or denied anything.

The words felt silly coming out of her mouth in a shrilly voice, but they came tumbling forth before she even had a chance to process what she wanted to say, "This is the game. I answered your question and now it's my turn. You have to answer my question. You have to answer. You have to."

"No. We both agreed that it was vital we keep my past a secret. Now, what do you know that you're asking me about John Shepard?" She hadn't heard Archangel speak with such hostility since the fateful day that they had met in the alley and he had her at gunpoint. She wanted to say something, but her indecision had her opening and closing her mouth like a fish gulping at air. Every time she thought she had the courage to speak, the words got lodged into her throat. Suddenly, she felt like she was choking. She took a few calming breaths, attempting to compose herself, but she could feel the pressure—building, building, building.

"I don't know anything, I—"

"What. Do. You. Know." He repeated the words, harsher this time, and the sudden swing in the conversation left her hyperventilating.

"Nothing! I swear—"

"Emma, I am responsible for a lot of men. If anything about my history has slipped through the cracks—I need to know, it can be dangerous not only for me, but my team—"

She cut him off, but her voice had gone back to the squeaky, high-pitched shrill, "Archangel, I promise. I promise you with every fiber of my being that I don't know anymore about you than what you've been willing to share. I'm not asking because of anything I heard. I'm asking because I've had this… thing," she spat the last word out as though it were poison, "hanging over my head like the goddamn sword of Damocles. Archangel, I—please. You know, you know that I have never gone out of my way to ask you for anything or taken advantage of our relationship. Just please. I'm asking you this one thing. Please." She begged. The pressure was no longer building in intensity, but spreading, traveling down, down, down—deep into her chest where it felt like an iron bar was attempting to pulverize her. She stared about, but the confines of the car now felt too close, too claustrophobic, as if the walls were closing in around her.

There was a pause and it was though she could hear Archangel's thoughts on how best to answer. Perhaps it was the strangeness of her desperately pleading voice, or perhaps it was her pathetic begging, but despite his better judgement, Archangel conceded and answered the question, "If you are referring to the first human Spectre…. Then, yes. I had crossed paths with him at one point."

She couldn't explain why, but this minor confession lessened some of the physical burden that her anxiety had been punishing her with. Though this concession was neutral, disguising whether the paths crossed in a negative or positive way, she felt slightly better knowing that he knew who her brother was. She knew that this lull in her nervousness was only temporary, but it gave her the motivation to continue with what she needed to say. It was only going to go south from this point onward, for she knew exactly what Archangel would ask next:

"Why?" She took one final deep breath. She was going to take the plunge.

"Listen," she began, her voice taking on the façade of normalcy. "I want to—no, I need to tell you something. Something really important, but… it's really, really, really hard. And you'll know everything, but I'm going to wander—and I'm just asking you to be patient with me."

"Alright," he answered, "You have my full attention, Emma. I'm here to listen."

She closed her eyes, memories swarming her vision and twisting her tongue.

"John Shepard… is… John Shepard was…"

 _The screen cut back to yet another attractive reporter, but this time, she was stationed outside the tranquil human embassies. A navy-blue bar at the bottom of the screen listed the so-called 'journalist's' name and qualifications, along with a blurb alerting viewers to the breaking news story regarding an Alliance officer._

 _"Oh, holy cannoli!" Shepard exclaimed with exasperation, "Not this tool!" She reached for the remote and shut the television off before the woman could begin her tirade. Emma was not a fan of Ms. Khalisah Bint Sinan Al-Jilani. She distinctly remembered watching the hostile interview between John and Al-Jilani when he began investigating Saren. Al-Jilani had the gall to attempt to frame John of selling humanity to the Council, but John had the good sense to shut that nonsense down right away. After that interview, Emma had vowed that it would be the last time she would ever give that horrid woman any attention. Whatever miraculous new thing her brother did that benefitted the galaxy, she could wait to hear it straight from the horse's mouth when he called her tonight at the scheduled time after her shift. This would certainly be better than listening to it filtered from the mouth of the Citadel's trashiest human reporter._

 _Emma checked her watch and got to her feet. She still technically had a handful of minutes left of her break, but decided to leave anyway, and get a jump on the day's work. She tossed her plastic yogurt container into the recycling been and approached the nearby work station in order to log into the hospital's system. Her eyes were scanning the queue of patients when she noticed an approaching nurse waving her down in her peripherals._

 _She looked up and smiled courteously at the tall woman, "Hello, hello."_

 _"Hey. Room 483 is asking for ya specifically. She's raisin' a big stink." The nurse slapped Shepard playfully on the back and continued onward. "Good luck with that basket case!" Emma frowned. She absolutely abhorred when her colleagues spoke about patients in this manner. Sure, some patients were… unwelcomingly antagonistic, but it was their job as medical professionals to ensure that every patient felt validated. Emma said nothing of this. It was not her place to give lectures on professionalism. For now, she had a patient that wanted her attention._

 _She knocked on the door of room 483 politely, and waited for the surly, "come in" before heading inside. She opened the door and mentally reviewed who the patient was before she spoke. Room 483 belonged to Mrs. Wilkinson, who had been brought in earlier by her daughter with claims of sudden, sharp chest pain that worsened with each breath—as well as difficulty breathing. Her pulse ox was a lowly 85%; her blood pressure of 130/82 which indicated prehypertension; and the electrocardiography showed sinus tachycardia. The pieces didn't fall into place until the staff had received the results of Mrs. Wilkinson's angiogram: pulmonary embolism._

 _"What can I do for you?" Emma asked pleasantly._

 _The older woman was laying in a sea of white linens, with the expression babies have after trying a lemon for the first time. She pointed an accusatory finger at Emma, "I want you to tell these fools to stop harassing me! I've been up all night because everyone needs blood from me." Her beady eyes were glaring deep into Emma's own, as though it was the doctor's fault that a giant lump of coagulated blood had lodged itself into her pulmonary artery. But, Emma was nothing if not patient and took the woman's curmudgeonly attitude with a sympathetic expression. The staff knew the minute the woman had been admitted that she would be an issue—the system having flagged her with a history of non-compliance._

 _"I am sorry to hear that, Mrs. Wilkinson, but—"_

 _"I don't understand why these people have to keep bothering me for stupid, stupid reasons. Why can't I just go home and lie in my own bed? That's all I'm doing here. I might as well be comfortable at home, if all I'm going to do is sit on my ass! My neighbor, Gerta Rauss, had an embolism too, and they didn't hold her hostage nearly this long."_

 _"I know it must be frustrating, but we are all doing everything in our power to make sure you get better as soon as possible. While there are some cases where patients can be discharged shortly after a pulmonary embolism diagnosis, we cannot do the same for you. Your case is critical enough that we need to keep you here for the time being. Your blood has to be drawn to make sure that you're responding well to the medication. I promise you, we want you at your best and at home with your children as soon as possible. You do want that, don't you?"_

 _Mrs. Wilkinson responded by humph-ing indignantly, crossing her arms across her broad chest, and stating, "the Good Lord will take care of me just fine. I don't know why my daughter made me come here."_

 _"She just wants the best for her mother." She answered plainly, not wishing to touch anywhere near the taboo territory of religion._

 _As though knowing this question would make Shepard squirm uncomfortably, the surly woman's head snapped defensively in the doctor's direction and she asked, "What do you believe in, Doctor Shepard?"_

 _Emma wrestled with the question for a moment, but she was able to find a response that managed to both answer and avoid the woman's question altogether, "I believe in giving my patient's the best medical care possible." And boy, was that the truth. Shepard wasn't a religious woman, but if she had to claim a faith, medicine would be it. It was her air. It was her life blood. Though the odds had been stacked against the Shepard siblings when they were young, there was no question that they were the best in their respective fields: John in the military and Emma in medicine. While Emma could never claim the fame that her brother had accumulated over the years, she was more than fulfilled by her chosen path._

 _"While I'm here, is there anything else I can do?" She asked, her eyes instinctively glancing upward over the river of wires that connected the patient to the monitor above her bed. All of the displayed vitals were normal- and judging from her feisty attitude, the cocktail of drugs that the IV had administered had made Mrs. Wilkinson more than comfortable._

 _"Can you turn the tv on? My daughter left with my reading glasses and I can't see a damn thing on this remote. I want to catch up on the latest episode of Heartwarmingly: I Love You."_

 _"My pleasure," Shepard said with a smile, stepping close and taking the remote out of the woman's hands. The television turned on, automatically displaying the local news channel. The station was covering the same story that they had announced prior to the end of Shepard's lunch break. Since Al-Jilani was still on the scene, Emma wanted to change the channel as soon as possible. But, before she got a chance, she read the headlines and froze._

 _"Alliance Vessel: SSV Normandy Destroyed. Death Count Unknown, Many MIA._

 _"No," Was all she could whisper. A fist gripped her heart in a vice grip, "No, no, no, no."_

 _"Hey! Change the channel! I don't care about this crap!" Wilkinson demanded, but Emma couldn't hear her. Instead, she was clinging to every single syllable that came out of Khalisah's mouth. The galaxy grew smaller and smaller until the only occupants were Emma and the vile Khalisah Bint Sinan Al-Jilani. She was no longer on the screen. In her stead was an image of her brother's beloved ship: the SSV Normandy, but it was unrecognizable. The ship had been utterly obliterated, scattered into thousands of indistinguishable fragments that floated lazily in the void above an icy blue planet._

 _"At this moment, the Alliance is stating that there are "several" missing but are unable to give an exact number. We are now receiving reports from the first survivors. They are stating that while the Normandy was patrolling the Omega Nebula for geth, an unidentified starship began to engage in hostile behavior. This foreign ship was capable of penetrating the Normandy's state-of-the-art defense system and rendered the kinetic barriers useless…"_

 _"Hey, you quack! I thought you were one of the good ones! Didn't you hear what I said? Change the channel, I want to watch Heartwarmingly: I Love You!" But Emma still wasn't listening. In fact, she found her face scrunching with indignation from the woman's pestering. Every fiber of Emma's being was dedicated to clinging to Jilani's every word._

 _"…just received a report from the SOS logs. An abandon ship order was given at precisely 20: 43 and all of the Normandy's escape pods were deployed within minutes of that order. However, the VI's aboard these pods detect several missing life forms. Those listed missing in action are: Bakari, Bennett, Chase, Crosby, Draven Rosamund and Talitha, Dubyansky, Emerson, Felawa, Gladstone, Grenado, Grieco, Laflamme, Lowe…"_

 _"Not Shepard. Not Shepard. Not Shepard. Not Shepard."_

 _"Pressly, Rahman, Tanaka, Tucks, Waaberi, and…"_

 _"Why aren't you listening to me! What are you? Deaf?_

 _"Not Shepard. Not Shepard. Not—"_

 _"And Commander John Shepard."_

 _"NO!" Emma shrieked, the sudden outburst so loud, it left her throat raw. By this point, several aides had appeared at the entrance of the room, alerted by the sound of the older woman's obnoxious hysterics. They hovered curiously, unsure of what to do as they witnessed Emma's knees buckle. Suddenly, she was a mass of flopping limbs on the linoleum floor. As she continued to watch with horror, Khalisah repeated the names of the missing, asking anyone with any information regarding their whereabouts to please report to the station. Emma's hands reached up to cover her face, nails digging into the delicate skin above her cheekbones._

 _"What the hell is wrong with you? Get off the goddamn floor. You're a doctor for Christ's sake, where's your dignity?"_

 _"Bakari, Bennet, Chase, Crosby, Draven…."_

 _"Don't say his name again. No. Please. No. Say it was a mistake. It was just a mistake. You've made mistakes before, say it was a mistake." Emma pleaded to no one in particular. Her mind was drowning out any noise that wasn't coming from Al-Jilani. The pain… the unbearable, unstoppable agony that ravaged her body, stabbed her organs, suffocated her heart, assaulted her senses— it was too intense. It was so bad she didn't even realize she had began to rock herself back and forth like a child._

 _"Laflamme, Lowe, and the hero of the Citadel, John Shepard."_

 _At the sound of his name, Emma wailed. A terrible, inhuman, wounded cry that caused the aides to leap into action. They neared her rocking body and began to lift her off the floor, each man taking her by the crook of her elbow._

 _Not John. Not John. They couldn't take him away from her. John wasn't killable, didn't they know that? No, it couldn't be John. It had to be a mistake. He would call her tonight and laugh at her for being so silly. He would call her tonight and chastise her, "Did you really think I would let some flashlights kill me, Em?" Yeah. That's what he would say._

 _The aides in their white scrubs were pulling Shepard out of the room now. Khalisah had stiffened, having received another break in the story. She held a finger to her earpiece as she listened in and then reported this new piece of crucial information, but Emma was too far to hear the words._

 _"Say it was a mistake!" Emma pleaded, but the image cut again. Now, they were displaying a picture of John. She recognized the image, it had been taken shortly after John had killed Saren and saved the Citadel from Sovereign. Before the men had pulled her away for good, she was able to glean the last bit of information from the screen's caption:_

 _Commander John Shepard, first human Spectre, savior of Skyllian Blitz and Hero of the Citadel amongst the 21-confirmed dead._

 _She would never receive that scheduled phone call. And that sent her into a frantic mania._

 _"That's him!" She howled as the men continued tugging her away, further along the hallway. "That's—"_

"…My brother. John Shepard was my brother." Emma whispered into the receiver. At this, the building pressure she had been suppressing broke free and she had to wrench the phone away from her face to dab at the tears. She forgot how awful reliving that terrible night was.

When she brought the phone back to her ear, sniffling, she could hear Archangel mid-response, "Emma… Spirits. I don't know what to say, I'm so sorry. I didn't know…"

"I know. No one knew about me, it was part of John's agreement when he joined the N7 program. The Alliance purges the extranet of anything that relates to John's civilian life. Anything that wasn't public gets erased, including me. They said it was 'cause they didn't want to worry about hostiles using me as leverage over him. And then, when John was invited into the Spectres… Well, after that, the Council damn near wiped me off the face of the galaxy. They let me keep the last name, but even that was an uphill battle."

"I had always wondered why your trailed started and ended on Omega…" Archangel deliberated.

"The Council sealed all of my records. I don't know how they do it, but it always made doing anything within Citadel space a hassle."

"Well, shit,"

"I loved him, you know." She announced suddenly, her eyes welling up once more with fat, wet tears. She needed to say this. She needed these words to be said aloud for more than just an empty room to hear. For the first time since that horrid day, she needed someone to listen to the pain she had been bottling for months. "I loved my brother more than anything in this entire galaxy. We… we had a rough start back on Earth. We were both orphans—didn't have anyone to take care of us, but us. I don't know if you know about the Skyllian Blitz, but it made my brother famous. After he became this big war hero, the Alliance told us—don't let anyone know about her… and no one did. Hold on. Wait, no. I lied. There was…. One person that served on John's crew on the Normandy that knew he had a sister, but John swore him to secrecy…. But to the rest of the galaxy: Doctor Shepard did not have a brother and Commander Shepard did not have a sister.

"When he was gone, I-I lost a part of myself that I didn't even know existed. When John died, I—" Emma couldn't finish her sentence. Those three words were a knife to the chest and a fresh wave of tears flowed freely. She began to weep openly, unable to contain the roiling sadness that raged within her. Lost to the moment, Emma sat the phone down in the cupholder. Crying was too gentle to describe what was now happening in the passenger seat of Nalah's skycar. Hell, even "sobbing" seemed too tame of a word. It was the type of whole-body wailing that can only happen when you come to terms with having well and truly lost something so precious to your being. Oh, it hurt. Goddamn, did it hurt! When she had collected herself enough to lift the phone back to her ear, she pressed the flesh of one finger between her teeth. Archangel, hearing her cries and lack of response, had been pleading for her to answer:

"Emma? Emma, please, I need you to answer me. Where are you? Please—"

She cut him off, ignoring the question.

With a shuddering breath, she managed to ask, "Do you remember, when we first starting speaking, that you asked me why I came to Omega?"

Archangel seemed surprised by the sudden change in subject but was eager to say anything that would keep the conversation going.

"Of course," Archangel told her.

"I… I had told you that I came here to help. And… I mean, I—I guess it wasn't a total lie… but, what I was trying to say, was that when John died, I went into a hole." She glanced up at the artificial lights of Omega for a few seconds, blinking away moisture from her eyelashes, "I don't think I ever really came out of it, if I'm being honest. But back then, it was this deep, dark, ugly, impenetrable hole. I can't tell you how many days I spent curled up in bed… but it was a… disgusting amount. And at one point I said- I said to myself, "if you do not get your ass out of bed right now, you never will". So, I did. I told you someone on John's crew knew about me. I called him up. I called him up and I said, you get me the hell off this station right now. And he did. And I ran away- ran away from the apartment I had boarded myself up in, ran away from the hospital I had been fired from, and I ran away from the Citadel with all its reminders. I needed a place where I could go back to helping people. It was the only thing I was good at and it was the only thing that gave me a sense of purpose. At the time, I told him to get tickets to the most random destination I could think of… but… looking back…"

"He died in the Omega Nebula… and you came to Omega."

She breathed an audible gust of air, "Right."

"But…" She knew he was searching for a delicate way to ask the obvious question. Since he couldn't come up with anything, she asked the question for him.

"But what does this have to do with anything? Sorry, I told you I was going to wander."

"You literally have nothing to apologize for. But… yeah."

"So, that brings me to why I asked you if you knew anything about John Shepard. Apparently, something is happening."

"Something is happening… to Commander Shepard?" He sounded incredulous, as if the words she said didn't translate properly.

"I know, it sounds crazy right? But… the first night we talked… someone sent me a letter—about John."

"Saying?"

Somehow, the trauma from this part of the tale now left her feeling distant and numb. She could repeat the words without breaking down simply because her mind refused to process the meaning of this information anymore. "Nothing much. Someone found his body and took a picture of the corpse. Whoever it is, they know about my…" she cleared her throat, "Drinking issue… and told me that it won't help me find him."

"What?" she heard him roar into the phone.

"Yep. And tonight. Well, I had received the email about tonight about a week ago. Not a letter, an email. It was ominous, but something similar to the letters I had been receiving."

"Hold on a second. Letters. As in, more than one?"

"Several. I've been getting them regularly for months now. All say the same thing. Then I got this email saying something about John and to meet in the pub if I was interested in learning more. So, I went to the pub and the guy—I'm assuming you saw who I was speaking to—"

"Late thirties, orange face-plated drell, wearing black clothing." Archangel recited, as though reading the information off of a C-Sec APB.

"Uh… yeah, right…. That guy. Well, I thought he was the one sending me letters, but, it wasn't."

"How can you be sure?"

"I'm not, but he told me the letters weren't his. He says the people he was representing want me to help with something, but they didn't tell me why or for what reason. But, if I agree, that I will be able to see John again."

"But Emma, he's…."

"Dead." She stated sadly, "I know. They told me "something big" is happening—whatever that means-and only John can stop it. It's all vague, but there are parties—multiple parties, if he's actually telling the truth—that are interested in resurrecting John."

"This sounds like a lot of nonsense."

This made her laugh, "That's what I said! But, he just told me that if it wasn't a possibility, than he wouldn't be speaking to me. Think about it, Archangel. I can hear it in your voice. Even you didn't know about me and John and you're the goddamn Batman of Omega."

"I still don't know who that is." Archangel interrupted dryly.

"That's not the point. Whoever this guy is and whoever is sending me these messages- if they're not the same people—they not only know that I'm Shepard's sister, but that I'm living on Omega. That's a lot of information to have about someone that technically doesn't exist and who ran away under a fake name on a cargo ship."

There was a pause. "I didn't think about that. Listen, Emma I want to get to the bottom of this, but I won't do anything without your permission."

"I don't even know where to begin though…"

"Can you send me everything they sent you? Emails, letters, all of it." Archangel asked.

"Oh, uh, of course. I'll send it all when I get home."

"Thank you. I know this isn't easy for you to tell me all of this. I want to thank you for trusting me enough to tell me it all."

Emma sucked on her bottom lip, "Archangel?"

"What can I do for you?"

Her lips pulled into a final frown and her throat cracked again. She had yet to complete her confession and it was this last one that was the hardest for her to admit. She wasn't looking for sympathy or for forgiveness, just for someone to listen, "I—I just…. The worst part of it is all this guilt. Sometimes, I stay awake at night and think about how I should have called him more. We were so busy, me with my practice and him having to save the galaxy from itself. I should have told him I loved him more. I should have told him how much he meant to me…. But you never talk to the ones you loved thinking that that conversation will be your last, you know? But… do you know what I regret most?"

"What's that?"

This brought a fresh torrent of tears that streamed down her cheeks, "Archangel… I… I didn't go to his funeral. Emma sobbed once into the palm of her hand and then bit down hard on the supple flesh to keep from screaming. "I…. just couldn't say goodbye. I could not be bothered to put on a stupid dress, so I could say goodbye to the person I was closest to in this entire galaxy. And I hate myself for that. But at the time, I couldn't say goodbye, because if I said goodbye, then that was it: then John would be gone for forever."

"So, that's it. More than anything—more than ruining my career, more than destroying my reputation as a doctor, more than exiling myself to this shitheap excuse of a planet- I regret not getting out of bed to say goodbye, just one last time."

And with that, she felt the last of her demons leave. The tears still came, but now… the tightness, the claustrophobia, the clawing at her throat, the suffocation- it was dissipating. She was still in that hole, that terrible dark hole… but now, she saw a light and she was reaching for it. She hiccupped one last time.

"I'm going to find him." She told Archangel.

"We'll find him." Archangel corrected, "I won't let you do this alone."

"You don't need to do this. You don't know him. This is for me. I don't care if they can bring him back or not—I mean, I do, but…"

"You don't need to explain yourself."

"Thank you…" She whispered, "For everything."

"I didn't do anything." He responded, but his tone was bitter.

"You listened, and that's all I ever needed."

A movement out of the corner of Emma's eye caught her attention. It was Nalah, having apparently finished her meal, poking her head out of the Wacky Tentacle. As the two women made eye contact, Nalah jumped at the sight of Shepard's red-eyed, pink-nosed, tear-streaked face. She ran to the car, dropping the bags of take-out on the hood and jumped in. Before Emma could even utter two words, she was wrapped up in the warm, loving embrace of Nalah's arms. The sudden (but not unwelcome) display of affection had the doctor burying her face into the fabric of Nalah's shirt and cry-laughing. She brought the phone to her ear one last time.

"I—Nalah's here now. Can we talk later?"

"Of course, whatever you need." He answered.

Emma clicked the phone off and tossed it into the back seat. She returned her face into the soft fabric of Nalah's shirt. Nalah tucked Emma's head beneath her chin, her lips pressing into Emma's hair as she rubbed soft, soothing circles into Shepard's back.

Too much had happened. She could never go back to being that prissy Citadel doctor with enough optimism to make even the likes of Disney cringe from the sweetness. But, for the first time in a long time, she finally acknowledged that she had people who cared—truly, wholeheartedly cared, and that made all the difference. She wasn't sure who or what was after John, or why. But, by hellfire she was going to find her brother and put him to rest. And she was going to succeed—not because of the intensity of the want, but because she was Emma fucking Shepard.

If there's one thing that the Shepard's were known for, it was that they knew how to get shit done.

"Nalah?" Emma's voice was muffled, "Remember when you said that I needed to act like an adult and put my big girl panties on?"

"Uh-huh."

"I think I'm going to need some help."

For a moment, Nalah didn't know how to react. But then, she realized it was a joke and giggled. And then Emma giggled. And then those giggles became laughter. Not because the joke was funny, but because it felt right.


	7. Chapter 7

On the monitor, the tell-tale buzz of a disconnected line whirred and Emma's smiling face was gradually replaced with grey static. A very exhausted Garrus Vakarian dropped his head into his upturned hands and let out an audible sigh. How could he have let things get this bad? None of this made any sense. What cruel twist of fate could have brought this woman to him?

Reflecting on the human, and all that had transpired since their first meeting, he realized he should have known from the instant they met just who she was. He couldn't put his talon on it… but, if he had to take a stab in the dark, he would say it was her eyes that betrayed the relationship. It wasn't the color, or shape, or anything of that nature that made those eyes special. No, you couldn't get a picture of a Shepard and get the same effect. It was the intensity. When a Shepard looked at you, it was like their gaze was piercing all the way through to your very essence- and it was those eyes that stared him down in the alley.

He could have laughed that morning, when he woke up on the floor with that petite, fragile-looking unconscious woman sprawled unceremoniously on her bed. It would have hurt worse than sin to laugh at that moment, but he certainly could have. Here he was, Garrus Vakarian: former cop and Normandy crew member-who had now defected to Omega to become this big, bad turian vigilante… and this tiny little civilian was audacious enough to pass out within arm's reach right beside him, a complete stranger! She was so careless, she did not even think to keep a weapon to protect herself should he prove to be hostile (which he had been initially). In fact, the only weapon she seemingly possessed—that measly knife—had been irresponsibly neglected near the tangle of blood-stained white sheets at his feet. At that time, he wrote the human off as nothing more than a fool—a talented and well-meaning fool, but a fool nonetheless.

As he got to his feet and left her apartment, he swore that the sense of discomfort he felt was simply because this complete stranger had saved his life twice over- once, by getting the Blood Pack off his back and twice by stitching him up. After he got evac-ed and Butler rattled off the details of the apartment's owner, he swore that the emotions he felt were because the complete stranger that had saved his life twice over was a Shepard, Emma Shepard. But… it was impossible for him to explain why he couldn't stop thinking about her eyes. Those piercing, knowing eyes.

After he left the apartment, days passed and passed until he just couldn't take it anymore and he sent Butler to go check on her… And even then, a part of him had yearned for her to request compensation for her compassion. Because if she did that, then he could pretend like she was little more than the common rabble. If she asked for a reward, he could pretend that her goodness was self-motivated, and he could move on. But… she never did, and it frustrated him to no end. No, instead he would wake up to her sweet, benign, 'how are you feeling today?', or 'I saw that you were involved with so-and-such, do you need me to do anything?'. While he never told her anything that could identify him, he found himself confiding into her like a teenager with a diary. As time progressed, he found her to be the only bright spark he could reliably expect on a daily basis.

It was those damn eyes, he knew. They were a siren's call that sang deadly melodies. He was helpless to resist the enticing allure of her company—even if it was relegated to only occur through electronic means.

Why had Shepard never told Garrus about his sister? And furthermore, what would the Commander think if he knew that he, Garrus Vakarian, had it bad for her?

His pensive musings were rudely interrupted with a crashing sound and a loud expletive belonging to an all-too-familiar voice. He sighed reluctantly and rubbed the heel of his hand against his zygomatic ridge.

"Butler, I know you're out there. Come on in." He called from behind the borrowed desk. He and the rest of his team had yet to leave the pub from earlier. When he called Emma, it had been from the supposed privacy of the manager's office, away from his men in the main area conducting their duties.

On the other side of the door, there was a hesitant pause. Finally, Butler pressed the latch and sheepishly stepped into the office Garrus had been taking refuge in. Butler neared the desk with demeanor of an abused dog waiting for an impending kick.

"He-eeeey Bossman!" Butler began in his friendly manner, pointing a finger at the open door, "I was just about to tell you that Mirki'it—"

Garrus cut him off with the wave of his hand, "Cut the shit. I'm _really_ not in the mood."

Chastened, Butler shrugged an apology, "Yeah, sorry about that. I should have known you wouldn't have bought that…" he pulled a chair out and sat across from Garrus. "That's really something though—about Ems, I mean."

Garrus was now dragging the palm of his hand across his forehead, "Just how much of that did you hear exactly?"

"… Okay, -hypothetically- on a scale of one to ten, how mad would you be if I- like I said- _hypothetically_ had my ear to the door the entire phone call?"

"Eleven" Garrus answered with squinting eyes.

"Oh… well in that case, I didn't hear squat! I don't even know what we're talkin' about. Who's Emma?"

Garrus didn't say anything at first, and then the irritation built up and he swept a furious hand across the plain of the desk with a cathartic growl. The movement slapped a glass vase across the smooth surface, and it shattered on the far wall, "How in the hell did you let this happen?"

Butler placed a hand on his chest and for the first time, the dramatic gesture wasn't on behalf of a joke or an over exaggeration, "Me? Why are you gettin' on my case? In what dimension is this _my_ fault?"

"I ordered you to look into the girl and find out everything you could the moment I contacted you from her apartment. This isn't just some colony drifter, she's Commander Shepard's sister."

Butler pointed at the device Garrus had used to contact Emma. The peculiar accent that Garrus always detected from Geoff was growing thicker with his outrage, "Ey! What the fuck is ya' problem? You heard what she said. Between the Council and the Alliance, how could ya' honestly expect me to catch a line on her? I showed you the data—all of it! You couldn't- and still can't- find shit about no Emma Shepard anywhere on the Extranet until she came here to Omega. Don't 'cha remember that? Once she arrived here, she lit up like a goddamn beacon, but prior to that—nada."

Garrus's bristling rapidly faded into embarrassment and he waved his hand, "I'm sorry. I'm just having trouble processing all this."

Geoff, good-natured man that he was, relaxed back into his seat now that he no longer needed to be on the defensive. He perched his elbow on the arm of the chair and gave Garrus a good, hard look.

"Boss… I mean, I didn't say nothin' because I figured… well, I guess it don't matter now what I thought…. But, with all due respect, how the hell could you not put two and two together?"

Garrus leaned backward in the chair, stretching his long legs out below the desk and placing his folded hands beneath his frontal carapace. He chuckled humorlessly as he thought of his response, "When I first found out that she was a Shepard _of course_ I wondered if there was a connection… but…"

"But what?"

Garrus leaned forward, "Butler, I've worked with humans nearly all my life and to this day, I still don't have the slightest clue about how your naming conventions work. In my time at C-Sec, there were _four_ Lee's, _three_ Sanchez's and _six_ Garcia's—not one of them related by _blood,_ mind you. Hell, some of them told me that they originated from completely different sides of your home planet—and they even had to use translators just to communicate. It boggled my mind. Only two of the three Sanchez's were related, and that's only because one of the Garcia's married the guy and took his name. That just doesn't happen in my culture... And… I don't know… as time went on and Emma didn't say anything… I just thought it was a sign."

"A sign for what?"

Garrus shook his head and his mandible flapped with a smirk, "Not sure. I'm a cop, not a poet. I came here after I lost my commander to make a name for myself, only to be saved by his surreptitious sister. What would you call the situation?"

Butler snorted, "Fucked."

"That's about as good of a description as any," Garrus mused.

"But… still, I don't get it. You gotta admit, it's a pretty big coincedence that you came to Omega because of a Shepard and then were saved on Omega, by _another_ Shepard. Doesn't that feel a little… I don't know the word I'm lookin' for, but ya' know what I'm trying to get at."

"We're damn near halfway across an entire galaxy from the Citadel. What would you think is the more likely scenario: that I ran into my dead commander's relative-that I didn't even knew he had-, or, I ran into some girl that just so happened to have the same last name as my commander?"

"That is a point well made." Butler conceded.

"I guess…" Garrus began, "I don't know. Maybe, I didn't _want_ to believe. Didn't want to make her seem more _real_. Didn't want to open old wounds. There's a phrase you humans use, "repeat a lie enough, and it becomes the truth."

Butler crossed his arms across his chest and gave Garrus a smug look, "Cute. With that kinda attitude, you could work for the Council."

"You know, that might be the single most hurtful thing you've ever said to me." Garrus answered brow plates raised. He let the joke ride for a minute before his face fell, "But, who she is isn't important now that we have someone threatening her. I know this doesn't fall within the team's mission statement, but I need to divert some manpower into getting to the bottom of this. I need to find out who's threatening her and what their motives are."

"Well, it's obvious ain't it?"

"What is?"

"Okay, say that all these loonies ain't so crazy, right? Say they really can, and will, bring back the Commander. What's the only, "something big" that would warrant goin' through all this?" Butler asked, leaning forward.

And then it hit Garrus like a ton of bricks, "Oh, shit." How could _that_ have slipped his mind?

"Oh, shit is right." Butler agreed, "You think the Commander told Emma about the Reapers?"

Garrus's mandibles flicked outward, "She hasn't said anything to me about them."

"I think the problem is, Emma hasn't told us _a lot_." Butler answered, his arms stretching upward. After getting a satisfactory snap out the joints, the human laced his fingers behind his head and looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully.

Garrus sighed. "What I wouldn't give to be with her right now."

Butler's face scrunched, "What's the issue? We're all big team can handle Mirki'it and his crew from here. Go be with her. She needs you."

Garrus scoffed, "Don't be stupid. You of all people know why I can't go to her."

Butler pulled his hands out from behind his head. Leaning in, he chose to secure his elbows on his knees as he dropped his pleasant expression, "No, I don't. Why don't ya' extrapolate?"

Garrus felt his nasal plates wrinkle with annoyance, "Are you kidding me right now? Because it's not funny."

"No, I'm not. You need to wake up and see how selfish you're bein'."

" _Me_?" Garrus scoffed indignantly, "You think _I'm_ being selfish?"

Butler jumped to his feet, gesturing irritably at the wall, "That's exactly what I'm saying! What? You think that 'cause now that you got Emma, it gives you a right to get all whiny? That ain't like you, boss. We all joined this team because we got someone worth protecting. The only one stopping you from being happy is you."

"It's not that simple. How can I look her in the eye and tell her that I purposefully avoided telling her that: not only did I know her dead brother, but served under his command for a year? I wasn't even aboard the Normandy during the attack and I _still_ feel guilty for Shepard getting spaced. There's more to it than me 'just being selfish'."

"Is there?" Butler asked, eyebrow perked. He pressed his knuckles to his chest piece, "because I talk to that girl nearly everyday and lemme let you in on a little somethin'. Until all this mess, Emma didn't want anything, but _you_. She couldn't give less of a shit about your past, your protection or what you could provide for her. It's you. She's been worried about ya since the first time _you_ made _me_ go talk to her."

Butler wagged his finger before continuing, "And don't think for a moment that she's just a job for me anymore. UH-uh! Nalah and I care, and I mean _really_ care about Ems. And she's hurtin'—hurting real bad. What I'm tryin' to say is that if you're not ready to man up and be there for her, then…" Butler's voice dropped ominously, "maybe you shouldn't be near her at all."

Garrus opened his mouth to argue. He wanted to chide his right-hand man for his insubordination… but, found that he couldn't. Butler had been telling it like it was. Emma needed him, and he was sitting on his hands because he was too afraid to move one way or another.

"You're right." Garrus admitted.

Butler cupped a hand to his ear and leaned over the desk, "What was that? I didn't hear it too well."

Garrus rolled his eyes. Give Butler an inch and you can expect him to take a mile, no matter the situation. "Don't get too excited. It was bound to happen at least once in a lifetime."

Butlerchuckled and sat back in his seat, having completed his lecture, "I know those words are comin' out of your mouth, but I swear I just hear Nalah when you say that."

For what felt like the millionth time that night, Garrus lurched forward and set his head back in his hands. "Spirits, how did I get myself in this mess? I don't even have a fetish for humans."

"Maybe it's the repressed feelings you've been harboring all this time for the Commander."

"You really need to learn when to shut up."

Butler shifted in his seat, "I'm just bustin' your balls. Listen, if it's any consolation, the only women—in my ol' humble opinion—that are finer than Emma is my gorgeous ball and chain Nalah, and my mama."

"Your mother?" Despite Garrus's shit mood, he found his mandibles fluttering with amusement.

Butler shrugged, "It's a Hispanic thing. In our culture, we're raised knowin' that mama is queen—always."

"What would your mother do if she knew what you were really up to here?" Garrus asked, thrilled to find a change in topic that could get his mind off things.

Butler shuddered, "Oh, don't ask me that, man. I'm taking this gig to my grave! I'm a grown man with hair on my chest, a wife, _and_ a kid on the way- but, I'm still terrified of _la chancla._ "

Garrus tapped his visor, "I think my visor glitched out. That didn't translate."

" _La chancla,"_ Butler pointed a finger to his boot, "Human mothers—some, not all—beat their children into submission with their shoes. Nine times out of ten, it'll be with a regular sandal, but sometimes they like variety in their choice of weaponry. Let me tell ya, it instilled the fear of God in me. Christ forbid Nalah wear high-heels. I swear on my grave, I get war flashbacks. Nalah might see footwear, but all I see is boomerangs and agony." Butler made a twirling motion with his two forefingers in an attempt to imitate the weapon.

Garrus felt a humming in his chest as he thought about how some behaviors transcended species, "Turian mothers would clap the back of our fringe with wooden or metal cutlery." He tapped the back of his own fringe to demonstrate.

Butler, who appeared not have been listening in, leaned forward, "Boss, can we talk about something else? Look! Look" He held his arm out for Garrus's inspections, "Look at this, I'm getting goosebumps just think about my old ass-whoopings."

Instead of finding a change in topic, Garrus melted into the soft leather of the chair, losing himself to his thoughts. Garrus thought he had his hands full protecting his team and Emma from Omega… now, he possibly had Reapers to contend with? During his time fighting the gangs, slavers, drug lords and other shit-tier byproducts of Omega, it never occurred to him to worry about them. And thinking about it now, the notion that one can simply just put an _army_ _of homicidal, kilometer-long, nearly invincible space ships hellbent on killing every living thing_ on the back burner, seemed ridiculous. But… that was the truth. It's hard to care about the impending slaughter when you're too preoccupied with making sure you'll be living until the next fight.

Really though, even if he did worry about the Reapers, what could he, a disgraced C-Sec officer, do? If the Council didn't believe Shepard about the Reapers, Garrus doubted he could get the Council to pull their heads out of their collective assholes. He was proud of the men and women he worked with, but even he knew they were nothing compared to the might of Shepard, the Normandy, and her crew. And speaking of the Normandy… who was Emma's contact? Garrus knew every crewmember on that marvel of a ship by name—every single one.

He supposed it could have been any of the grunts that he didn't get to talk to much. There were plenty of men and women that just took care of the day-to-day tasks. For all he knew it could have been Liara, she was a doctor, though, not _that_ kind of doctor. Perhaps it was one of the other human squad members—Kaidan or Ash? _Well_ , Garrus thought grimly, _no, it couldn't be Ash, now could it? She died protecting the bomb._ He could also rule out Tali. He knew she had seen a doctor on the Citadel during her Pilgrimage, but he also knew for a fact it had been Doctor Michel, not Shepard, that cared for the quarrian. Joker? Garrus nearly let out a bark of laughter. Fate could not be that cruel to the poor girl.

Garrus realized how long he had been silent and looked up, only to discover Butler had a similar pensive expression. While Butler was never one to take any situation too seriously, the rare moments he did hunker down like this, Garrus found his insight invaluable. Because of this, he found himself asking, "Why are you making that face? What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing crazy. I'm just… I'm tryin' to remember somethin' that Em said when I first met her." Butler answered slowly, a hand rubbing the back of his head.

"You can get to the point any day now." Garrus encouraged sarcastically.

"Well, okay, right. So, when I met her she had on these like pink, fluffy pig slippers and I can't stop thinkin' about them."

So much for valuable insight. Garrus pinched the sides of his head, "So help me, if you don't get to a point, I will rip your spine out through your ass and beat you with it."

"Bear with me now, she told me that her brother gave her those slippers. I didn't put much thought into it then but… now that I know that 'brother' Shepard is _the Shepard_. Well, you can see my dilemma."

"Which is what exactly?"

"You mean to tell me that the thought of the great, amazing, harder-than-nails Commander Shepard standing in line in an actual store, buyin' _pink, fuzzy, oinking pig slippers_ for his sister isn't the strangest damned thing you ever imagined?"

Garrus shook his head, "We currently have a whole smorgasbord of problems to deal with and that—that's what has you so perplexed?"

"Well… you gotta admit: it is perplexing."

Garrus was at a loss for words and simply looked at the human. How could someone so intelligent be so… he didn't know the word to describe Butler, but there was a word out there somewhere that fit him. Butler was Garrus's right-hand, but sometimes he folllowed some seriously meandering bunny-trails.

"Maybe it would have been better if I never said anything." Butler acknowledged. He stayed quiet for a second and then snorted, "But you know somethin'? Speaking of that day—When I couldn't find anything on her, I actually tried lookin' up the band on her shirt to see if it had brought up any matches. Seriously, I was _that_ desperate. I can't remember the name anymore… but you know Emma, she likes some weird shit. It was something Krogan… Damn. What was that name? It ain't important, but now I'm going to obsess over it and it'll bug me to the end of days if I don't remember the name…"

Butler rubbed his chin curiously, "It was Honorary somethin' or other… goddamnit. And you know what the worst part about this is? In two or three hours, I'm going to be cookin' dinner or some shit and it'll hit me then. What the hell was that name? Birdbutts…? Turdnut…? Curdsnot…?"

Garrus's head snapped up, "Urdnot?"

Butler slammed his hand down on the desk excitedly and shoved a finger at Garrus, "Mmm! Mm! That's it! Thank you! Honorary Urdnot! You just saved my head from two hours of agony! Damn, boss, do you like that band too or something? 'Cause I couldn't find anything on it."

"Wrex!" Garrus exclaimed, jumping to his feet. He raced for the door and Butler called out to him.

"You mean like the dinosau- Ey! Where ya' goin'? I thought we were having a nice heart-to-heart here!"

Garrus stopped short in the doorway, "I know who Emma's contact is."

"Wait, so you mean to tell me you're goin' to rush off to go talk to this guy, but you ain't gonna do nothin' about Emma?" Butler asked, twisting in the chair with his brows furrowed.

Garrus banged his crest against the metal framing. "Shit. About that—do me a favor and have Nalah stall Emma from going home. I want to do something for her."

Butler looked excited and his brows flew skyward "You're gonna come clean?"

Garrus felt his mandibles clamping down hard against his jaw, "…no…"

Butler looked like Garrus had told him there was no tooth fairy, "But we just talked—"

"I know," Garrus started, but Butler cut him off.

"She deserves to know." Butler reprimanded, and all traces of humor had vanished from his face. Gone was Butler the man. Now Garrus stood before Butler, the overbearing, overprotective surrogate older brother.

"I'm planning on it… just… not now. When the time's right, I'll tell her everything." Garrus answered. When Butler opened his mouth to voice a protest, Garrus continued, "She's a smart girl and I was the only turian on the Normandy. If she finds out that I served with John, then she'll know Archangel's identity and… I'm not ready for that. None of us are. Soon, but not yet."

Butler's mouth pinched, not with disapproval, but with acknowledgement. He brought his shoulders up in a half-hearted shrug and nodded, "I can respect that. Alright. You do what ya gotta do, I'll message Nalah and steer them off."

"Thanks. I can always count on you," Garrus praised before he was out the door. He hurried down the hall a few paces before he realized something and doubled back. Butler was still in the chair, as if he had expected for Garrus to do this. "By the way, we _did_ get Mirki'it to confess, right?"

Butler made a face and gave Garrus the 'okay' sign with thumb and pointer finger, "Oh, we nailed his ass to the wall. Bastard didn't know what hit him. He was expecting another shipment by the end of the week."

"Good man. Give him an eyeful of Red Sand on my account." And with that, he was out the door.

From now on, Emma would refer to Nalah only as "Mother Hen". Nalah bound Emma up to her chest as if expecting her embrace to be a bulwark against all of Shepard's woes and traumas. Emma repeated a condensed version of her confession to Nalah. Nalah said nothing throughout, choosing instead to listen patiently the whole way through, and patting Emma's hair into place. When Emma finished, Nalah allowed Emma to pull away and she dabbed delicately at the doctor's eyes with the sleeve of her cardigan. When Emma brought the hem of her shirt to her to her running nose, Nalah stealthily read the message that her husband had sent.

"I know what will lift your spirits," Nalah suggested, suddenly.

"No offense, but if you say, 'cookies soaked in pickle juice' I don't think I will ever honestly talk to you again." Emma teased, the beginnings of a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. Nalah's face broke out into a grin.

"No, that's not what I had in mind. But, it's close. You want to grab some ice cream before we head home? I can't think of a time where it is more needed than now." Nalah offered.

Emma sucked her lips inwards and thought it about it for a moment before shaking her head and exclaiming, "Yeah… What the hell. After my meeting with the drell, nearly getting shot by a krogan, Aria, and this—I think I earned a little chocolate ice cream, right?"

Nalah pinched Shepard's cheek, "Chocolate ice cream… with _sprinkles_."

Emma's eyes grew playfully wide and she donned a childish voice, "And whipped cream with a cherry on top?"

Nalah snorted and opened the car just enough to retrieve the forgotten leftovers from the hood. When she returned, she answered, "Oooh, definitely."

"What about chopped peanuts?"

As the ignition hummed, Nalah held up a hand up to Emma and screwed her face into a serious expression, "Okay, don't get carried away now."

Emma snapped her fingers gloomily, "Darn. You just don't want me to have any fun."

"You didn't eat your food. If you eat all your dinner next time, _maybe_ I'll get you peanuts too." Nalah scolded in a motherly tone.

"You know, they never teach us this during our rotations. Do mothers get their 'mother voice' at the moment of conception or is it just something you guys pick up along the gestation?" Emma asked, finding a more comfortable position in the seat.

"Oh, no Geoff has provided me ample opportunity to practice, don't you worry." Nalah answered, and the brutal honesty in that one statement ripped an unexpected cackle out of Emma. It was this silly banter that continued through their trip to the ice cream joint, while they ate their desserts (and yes, Nalah ended up getting Emma the chocolate ice cream with sprinkles, whipped cream, a cherry _and_ peanuts)—all the way until Nalah had double parked outside Emma's apartment.

Sighing, Emma knew that it was time for her to take her leave. Though parting from Nalah at this point would be like parting from reality itself, she knew that if she didn't get some rest soon, she would be paying for it tenfold in the morning when Garka, or Grizz, or whatever nimrod barged through her door to wake her up.

"Do you need me to come in?" Nalah asked tenderly.

"No… but, thank you… for everything. Seriously, next week I'm taking you and Butler out to eat. I feel awful that I skimped out on the bill at the Tentacle."

"Don't be stupid," Nalah chided. "You don't have to do anything."

Shepard began to amass her belongings that had now scattered to the four corners of the car, "I'm not offering because I think I have to, I _want_ to." When all of Shepard's belongings were gathered in her lap, Nalah's nimble fingers caught Shepard's wrist.

"You're going to get through this. Me and Geoff and Archangel- we're all here to support you. It's okay to ask for help. This doesn't have to be just your burden anymore." She assuaged. Emma felt her smile grow and she pulled Nalah into as tight of an embrace as Nalah's pregnant belly would allow.

"I don't know what I could have possibly done to deserve you all, but it must have been something real good," Emma extolled quietly. With that, she clambered out of the car with her leftovers and belongings bundled in her arms. She managed to blow a kiss goodbye to Nalah, who waited in her car until Emma had safely ambled into the apartment building. Shepard turned down the lobby and dragged her sorry, aching self into the lift.

It was here that she felt the welcome buzzing at her hip. Nalah must have informed Archangel that she had successfully gotten Emma home. Emma rearranged the junk she held, shoving the lukewarm Styrofoam box under the armpit of one arm while she reached for her phone with the other. When she managed to get the phone out from her back pocket, she sandwiched it between her shoulder and ear.

"Hey," She breathed into the mic.

"Hey," she heard Archangel respond from the other line, "You know, I had this big speech planned in my head for when we spoke again… and now that I hear your voice, I can safely say I don't remember a single word of it."

She beamed, exiting the elevator and onto the landing of her hallway, "Never would have pegged you as the type to be rendered speechless by a pesky human in the middle of a meltdown."

"That's only because you've never seen my Fornax collection, Shepard." He answered, and her smile grew wider. "But, I'm not calling you to talk about my imaginary pornography collection. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

"Fine?"

She shrugged, forgetting he couldn't see, "I'm… maximally as fine as the situation allows. Talking to you and spending time with Nalah helped... But, you sound distracted. Is there something specific on your mind?"

"If it's all the same to you, I've been doing a lot of thinking… about…. Well, about us and there's something I want to talk to you about."

Emma found herself stopping short for several reasons. The first, and most obvious reason, was that in the six or so months that she and Archangel had been exchanging flirtatious messages, they had never mentioned that it was anything more than that- flirting…. And secondly, she had rounded the corner to see a package sitting right outside her door. It was an unassuming thing, a box approximately the size of a basketball, wrapped in plain white paper. Knowing the type of lunatics that occupied Omega, she dared not venture any closer lest it contain dangerous explosives.

"Uh… Not that I'm trying to change the subject, but there's an unmarked package on my front step."

"I know there is," He admitted, "Don't worry, I put it there. It's safe."

"Oh, okay. What's in it?" She pulled her key fob out of her pocket and her door automatically unlocked. She bent low to pick the box up and gave it a good, hard rattle to hear what was inside. Whatever the box contained, it was singular, hard, and mildly heavy.

Apparently, Archangel heard her ministrations, and he immediately exclaimed, "Yeah, no! Don't! Don't do that. It's fragile."

She bared her bottom teeth sheepishly and muttered an abashed apology, "Oops! My bad. But, to quote a desperate man, 'what's in the box?'"

"It's to go along with what I wanted to talk about. I'll tell you when to open it- it'll only make sense when I'm finished saying what I have to say."

"Alright," she said cautiously, "I'm all ears." Her anxiety for the forthcoming conversation had her mouth feeling tacky and her heart racing. Fear took over and she quietly wondered if, after everything, he had decided she was too much of a hassle, and he was going to call the whole thing off. Perhaps the gift was actually a parting goodbye? Was she about to be broken up with over the phone—when she never realized that she was in a real relationship at all?

"I'm not going to act like I've ever been interested in…" he cleared his throat, " _cross-species interrelations_ … but, with you, everything is different. It would be a lie if I said there has been a single day that's passed since I woke up in your apartment, where you _hadn't_ crossed my mind. I don't know what the protocol is on human relationships but I…"

Emma found herself slumping on to her bed, hand delicately covering to her gaping mouth. Into the phone, in nothing more than a hushed whisper, she declared, "I want it, too,"

She heard the pleasured purr of his subharmonics and found herself smiling weakly, "I hoped you would say that… Spirits, I want you, Emma. I want you, butyou need to know that as "Archangel" I will never be able to give you a normal relationship. I have more enemies than friends. I can't even think about showing you my face without putting you at risk. It feels crazy to even consider this-us. A good, rational turian would know that this is a _terrible_ idea."

Her heart sank, "What exactly are you saying?"

"That I am not- by _any_ stretch of the imagination- a good turian and that…" he paused to gather his thoughts, "that when it comes to you, I have _never_ rational." Upon hearing the drop in his voice, she withdrew a sharp intake of hair. The way his voice dipped into nothing more but a bass-y rumble sent a jolt of lightning down her abdomen and lower—way _lower._

"So, what you're saying is—"

"If you're still in, then I'm still in."

Emma found herself laughing, a happy peal of bell-like laughter, "Are you trying to imply that I would have it any other way?"

"I'm _trying_ to give you an out before either of us gets hurt. If we do this, I… I'll be honest, I still can't tell you who I am, my face, my history—none of that. I realize that this isn't the type of arrangement most women would find agreeable. I want to know that this is something you really want."

She wet her lips, "Good thing, I'm not most women then."

"Em—"

"No," She cut him off, "I would never ask for more than you are willing to give. Jeez, how do I say this? Since we met, I… I-I wake up and I'm _excited_. I'm excited to get out of my bed so that I can look at my phone- because I know that if I do, there's a chance that I'll see your name there. The day I first heard from you—you were a rabbit hole and I fell—I fell hard. For the first time in a long time, I feel _alive_ and it's exhilarating."

Another sigh, but it was a happier one, "I'm sorry it has to be this way."

"Don't." She answered, heart squezing tight, "When the time comes, you'll know. I'll wait, as long as you need. There's no rush from my end. We'll build up confidence in one another and- well, given tonight, I think trust is something we both need to work on."

"That's one promise I hope to keep."

And there it was… She was fortunate that the old-fashioned cell phone did not permit Archangel to see her, because he would have surely thought her deranged. The excitement and adrenaline coursing though her veins had her leaping to her feet and hopping about like a goddamn idiot. But, she couldn't help it, she was literally too exhilarated to contain herself. She stole the pillow from her bed and held it flush against her mouth, letting loose a muffled scream of giddy.

"You can open the package now, by the way." Archangel advised in an amused tone. The way he said it, Emma realized he had heard at least _some_ of her whimsical shenanigans.

"Oh! I forgot about that! Give me a sec—just hold on." She called with heated cheeks, as she ceased her slaphappy hopping and picked up the box. She perched herself on the edge of her bed, box laid delicately in her lap. She peeled the top off and looked inside. "I… don't get it."

Held within the box was what could only be described as… a giant, plastic, egg-shaped... thing. She lifted it out of the box and inspected it for any marks or instructions that would convey its purpose or function, but there were none. To Emma, it just looked like an enlarged, soft-ball sized egg.

"Not to sound ungrateful… but, what is it?" She asked, rotating her wrist to inspect it closer.

"You'll see, just be patient. Lay your hand on it for three full seconds." He instructed. She did as she was told, and suddenly, the little egg began to emit a gentle, white light. Where her hand laid, it glowed cotton-candy pink, a perfect outline the shape of her hand. She pulled her hand off and the pink light faded. She cocked her head, confused. As though hearing her thoughts, Archangel murmured, "Now watch."

Without warning, a corner of the egg glowed a delightful baby blue. However, instead of a five-fingered human print that mirrored her own appendage, she saw a three-fingered hand and realized it must have been him—that was him, _his_ hand . Her gasp told him she saw.

"Emma, I know you needed me tonight and I failed you. I can't be with you physically, but I can be with you here, now, like this."

The blue hand on her egg drifted tenderly back and forth, reminiscent of the way that Nalah would rub Shepard's arm or thigh to comfort her. Deliberately, Emma placed fingers atop the blue outline on the egg. The egg flared pink at her touch momentarily, and gradually, that color faded. As it faded, the pink of her own touch swirled with the blue of his to become a deep, gorgeous amethyst. Not his touch, or her touch, but _their_ touch. Her heart gave a happy little squeeze and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't supress the smile on her face. She heard a subharmonic hum of satisfaction and knew he saw it too.

She swallowed tightly and whispered into the phone, "I love it."

"Ems?"

"Mmhm?"

"After doing some _more_ thinking, there's one thing I want to tell you about me. The reason you came to Omega- the real reason."

"Yeah?" She found her head cocking curiously.

"It's mine, too."


	8. Chapter 8

Clearly, her nighttime talk with Archangel had bled into her dreams.

 _At the moment, she was nestled under the delectable folds of the plush, down comforter from her bed back on the Citadel. The bedding had been ridiculously priced, but the unfathomably soft, doughy black blanket was an indulgence she was compelled to satiate. About her waist was the brown-skinned, grey-plated arms of her lover, tugging her back warmly against a solid chest. The lights of her lavish apartment had dimmed to a barely-discernable, warm glow, while heavenly candles flickered on her dark walnut furniture. With a satisfied purr, she twisted in her companion's arms so that she could rest her delicate chin on his bare shoulder and stare up into his blank face._

 _And by blank, she didn't mean the expression. Where eyes, a nose, a mouth and mandibles would be, there was nothing._

 _Of course, in real life, this would be a horrifying experience that would completely ruin the enchanting setting, but in the context of the dream, it made perfect sense to her. Her fingertips skated over the curve of the anterior carapace. The sensation of his bare skin against her own had her sucking her bottom lip beneath her teeth. She hitched her knee across his waist and took pleasure in the sensation of his hand coasting the delicate flesh of her thigh._

 _"Enjoying yourself?" the faceless turian asked. No, not faceless turian. This was Archangel, she had to remind herself. The sensation of the sharpened talon against her skin sent an excited shiver down her spine._

 _Boy, did she wish her brain was creative enough to generate a goddamn face._

 _A lazy smile tugged at swollen lips and she pulled herself up momentarily to kiss the Archangel avatar, "Can't remember a time where I've enjoyed myself more."_

 _The other ungloved claw reached upward and caressed an errant lock of hair that had tickled the skin of his neck. He tucked the insulting strand delicately behind the shell of her ear before cupping her face._

 _"Aren't you neglecting?"_

 _She felt her expression contort with confusion, "What does that even mean?"_

 _"You're neglecting him." The faceless voice observed dispassionately. Her breath caught. The dim lights extinguished into an impenetrable darkness. The embrace of her lover loosened. The bed vanished out from beneath her._

 _And suddenly, she was falling._

 _Falling, falling, falling. Down and down into the darkness she went, tumbling end over end into the abyss. Her mouth was opened wide with a noiseless scream. Her limbs flapped about hopelessly until suddenly, and without reason, she found herself standing on a barren patch of ice. The only thing noticeable about the place was the harsh wind that forced her mussed hair to sting her face. In this frigid wasteland, there was nothing but white… endless, eye-burning white…. But… but, what's that? In the distance… is that?_

 _Like moth to a flame, her attention was drawn toward a dark lump lingering near the icy horizon. Without much else to call her attention, she found herself running towards the black mass. As she neared, the mysterious lump took form._

 _It was John. And where she had once been snuggled cozily beneath the luxury of a plush comforter, he had been buried neglectfully under a devastating amount of ice and snow. Upon her approach, the corpse of her brother began to stir, rattling the icy blanket above him until he managed to stand before her with his ruined body and cyanotic skin. His dead eyes rolled in their sockets to meet her gaze._

 _"I see you're already beginning to forget me." He announced coldly. His voice sounded like a death rattle._

 _She shook her head ferociously, "Never!"_

 _Her arms flung outward, attempting to tug her stoic brother into her warm embrace. It had been so long since she had seen her brother alive, even in this horrific dream state. She yearned to feel John's loving, fraternal embrace again—it had always been the only time he ever permitted that indominable façade of his to falter. However, when her arms closed in around his frame, she found herself holding only empty air. When she looked up, he had suddenly reappeared—just out of reach._

 _"You're going to let them take my body? Do you care so little?" He asked, his expression unchanging._

 _She opened her mouth to speak and found it impossible. Her lungs expelled air, her vocal cords vibrated, her mouth contorted to form words… and yet, no sound was emitted. She attempted to scream her thoughts, to deny his unthinkable accusations—she was trying, goddamnit! Couldn't he see? The more she attempted to speak, the darker their world became. While the snow beneath their feet remained, the blindingly white atmosphere faded into night._

 _But, the more she squinted into it, that impenetrable inky blackness, the more she found that it wasn't some formless slate, but a creature—immense in scope and nightmarish in shape. As the eldritch abomination's form came into fruition, John began to speak again._

 _"It's control they're after and they will do everything to obtain it. Do not let that happen." He told her ominously._

 _But even if she could respond, she didn't have a chance—for the dark creature behind her brother emitted a ghastly, ear-splitting roar._

 _The roar was accompanied by a concentrated beam of light aimed right at her. As the laser struck her flesh,_ she awoke.

BAM! BAM! BAM!

Coated in a fine sheen of cold sweat, Emma lurched forward with a gasp. With a hand clutching her aching chest, her head instinctively jerked towards the opposite end of her shabby studio apartment towards her front door, which rattled loudly under the rapping of a fist. With a practiced flick of her wrist, she brought to life the light of her omni-tool and squinted until she could discern what time it was 03:54. There was no way that this was one of Aria's men coming to pick her up. She glanced at the cell phone Archangel had given her as an uncomfortable tingle brought the hairs on the back of her neck to attention.

 _No._ She thought to herself, _if this is someone dangerous, they will get to me before Archangel does._

Gingerly, she took to her feet and began to deeply regret having never invested in a side piece for situations such as this. Her fingers felt blindly along her decrepit, particle-board nightstand until she was able to grip the base of her lamp. With an abrupt tug, she managed to yank the cord free from its outlet and carried the fixture at her side as though she were a knight with a mace.

Her bare feet padded across the length of the cramped space. Who in their right mind would be banging at her door at this ungodly hour? Her mind was processing information at lightning speed. Archangel would never frighten her like this and the Butlers had her access pass. She never gave her home address to patients, so that ruled that idea out. She began to worry. Did someone follow her home last night? Could this be the bag of dicks that was tormenting her? Is the creepy drell from last night (provided he really wasn't the same person that had been sending her letters)?

BAM! BAM! BAM!

With a shuddering breath, she dared a peek through the peephole, preparing her formidable weapon, and…

"Mordin!" She exclaimed with relief. She punched the command console to allow him in. The doors slid open to reveal the salarian geneticist, who cocked his asymmetric head and drank in her unkempt appearance.

"Greetings, Shepard. It is good to see you again. Hope you saw message."

She opened her mouth, "wh—", but Mordin was too fast of a talker for her to interrupt his diatribe.

"Understand that at this hour, humans prefer to be asleep, however curiosity overrode inclination for etiquette. Incapable of _not_ thinking about new plague since the moment email entered inbox. Wish to learn more." He paused momentarily to look at the lamp still wielded loosely in her hand, "Lamp grossly insufficient to incapacitate attacker." He scolded offhandedly.

She stared lamely at the cheap piece of lighting and shrugged, "You just haven't seen my backswing."

Mordin answered with a disbelieving expression and then stared at her expectantly.

"Oh! Uh, come on in, I guess." She answered with a yawn, gesturing inside with her makeshift mace. "You mentioned something about a message? I must have been asleep when you sent it." She took a step back in order to allow him room to enter her apartment before hitting the command console with her elbow. As the male alien entered her home, she found herself glancing anxiously down at her wardrobe: an oversized t-shirt that fell to mid-thigh and underwear. Had it been anyone else, she would have felt the heat bloom in her cheeks from the sexual implications, but with Mordin, the embarrassment was- well, Mordin was so sexless that even a Ken doll would pity him. Her embarrassment stemmed from having someone she respected so highly see her so… unsightly. To her right, she watched him settle contently into a seat at her rickety dining room table.

"Emergence of new disease fascinating. Have been studying data carefully, especially find symptoms prior to death interesting. Complete destruction of immunity—near annihilation of macrophages and release of cytokines-"

"Mordin," Emma called softly.

"—Perhaps a virulence plasmid? No, no, no. Couldn't be that. But, abnormally high production of nitric oxide must be cause of apoptosis of lymphocytes, massive tissue damage, loss of vascular endothelium and the tunica, which would inevitably lead to—"

" _Mordin_ ," Emma repeated, her voice pleading.

"Perhaps plague induces T-cell death as a result of deregulated DC/T synapse—?"

"MORDIN!" Emma shouted, causing Mordin pause. Once his attention had been wrangled into submission, she lowered her voice, "It is 4 o'clock in the morning. You gotta give a girl some time before you start discussing the molecular mechanisms of pathogenicity."

Mordin had the courtesy to look sheepish, "Sorry. Lots of information to cover, plenty of work that must be done."

"Can I just get myself together and something to drink? After that, we can discuss macrophages and plasmids until the shifty-looking space cows come home. That okay?" She asked with a gentle smile. He nodded, but as soon as he finished, he began to fidget uncomfortably—folding and unfolding his hands on the surface of the table while his knee bounced.

 _Poor fella_ , she thought, _he's all but bursting with excitement._

She walked back towards her bed, where she replaced the lamp on her nightstand (but was far too lazy to actually plug it back in) and grabbed the phone that rested there, before excusing herself to her cramped bathroom. Once behind closed doors, away from Mordin's calculating gaze, she felt her composure drop and she hunched over the sink. Dark bags hung under her exhausted eyes, which were red-rimmed and half-shut from her lack of restful sleep. What scared her most was the haunted look she found staring back at her in the mirror.

She remembered her dream, and the obvious implications her subconscious was attempting to hint at. She leaned her forehead against the cool surface of the mirror, her eyes shutting momentarily. Of course, through her training and experience, she had been well acquainted with the grief that burdened the living when they thought of the dead… but even then, she could not shake the feeling that she was allowing herself to be distracted from what really mattered. John was not just some hot-shit that the galaxy admired, he was _the_ hot-shit. The hot-shittiest of them all, if you would.

She ran the faucet and splashed her face with frigid water to shock her into sanity. _No_. She reminded herself. _You deserve to be happy. You can be happy while still taking care of John. You don't have to have one or the other._

Her eyes gradually glided upwards and she was forced to come face-to-face with her dripping wet reflection. She wished she could believe all that.

Pushing herself away from the sink, she glanced down at her phone. It was evident that after she had fallen asleep, Archangel had written her a message. While the shameful feeling yet lingered from before, she couldn't deny the way his name on her screen caused a warm feeling to well up in her chest.

 _-[Archangel] 01:36_

 _I had to go back to the pub from earlier to tie up some loose ends._

 _The manager here was human. Liked 'oldies' from back on Earth, apparently._

 _One of the songs reminds me of you._

 _-03:58_

 _Would love to know what song that was :)_

While she was at it, she decided to check her omni-tool for unread messages, recalling the notification from when she had checked the time just a few minutes ago. She lowered the seat down on her toilet (so she wouldn't fold in like a cheap lawn chair) and read her messages-because hey, everyone knows that the toilet is the best place to answer texts. She took her seat upon her porcelain throne.

The first set of messages had been from Nalah, accompanied by an image. Emma was forced to clasp a hand over her mouth to keep from giggling.

 _-[Nalah B.] 01:25_

 _I know you're probably asleep. But look. Look at what the idiot I married did._

[The attached image was of a pot of water with macaroni cartoon characters at the bottom of the pot. However, what the cartoon characters were of was difficult to distinguish, as the water was caked with basketball-orange clumps that floated at the top.]

 _-He. Didn't. Remember. To. Drain. The. Fucking. Water. First._

 _-HE'S THIRTY-TWO YEARS OLD._

The second set of messages had been from Bev.

 _-[Beverly T. (PROVIDER OF FOOD)] 01:35_

 _Hello love, sorry this so late, just finished my shift and heard you swung by the restaurant. Talia told me that she told you about the expansion, sorry I couldn't see you! /3_

 _Are you free today? I'm checking a new place and we could use an outsider's perspective xoxo._

The last message had been from Mordin, just as he had mentioned at the door. When she noted the time that the message had been delivered, she fought the urge to run out of the bathroom and beat him senseless.

 _-[Mordin S.] 03:42_

 _Coming over now. Much to discuss._

After responding to Nalah and Bev, she lifted herself off the toilet and slid a pair of pizza-stained, grey shorts on that she had stolen from her hamper. She exited the bathroom and made her way into the kitchenette where Mordin still waited, shaking with anticipation.

"So how are things at the clinic?" She asked as she rummaged through the nearly-empty cabinets for a box of caffeinated tea. She ordered the VI to heat up a pot of water and leaned her butt against the age-stained counter as she awaited Mordin's answer. "Would you like anything?"

"No, thank you. Clinic good. Found an assistant named Daniel after you left. Human. Young. Adequate technically, but too naïve. Too trusting. Have yet to find sufficient replacement since you left."

Shepard's smile grew, "Coming from you, that might've been the nicest compliment I've ever received."

"Wasn't intended as such." Mordin admitted.

"I know it wasn't. But, anyway. I really do miss working back in the clinic. It's been a while since I've had a challenge after I started working with Aria." Shepard confessed. Her water boiled, and she poured the liquid into a mug, with the teabag ready to go. She took her place across from Mordin and sipped delicately at her drink.

"So, have you finally managed your alcoholism?" Mordin asked, his head cocked curiously.

Shepard nearly did a spit-take, "Okay, I think that's enough small talk."

Mordin seemed only too eager and activated his omni-tool, pulling up the files she had sent him. In order to keep pace with the astute alien, Shepard did the same, eyes glossing over pages upon pages of the file Aria had sent of incident reports and the subsequent containment.

"Aria's quarantine vastly more efficient than anything that could have ever been deemed possible, only a single failure. Fascinating results. However, within the quarantine zone, rate of infection jumped 65%..."

Folding her arms over her chest, Shepard gave Mordin an incredulous look, "Are we actually going to discuss this thing as if this isn't a disease that Aria didn't scan right? The chances of a new plague that can infect nearly every species here simultaneously…" She laughed aloud, "Well, it's silly to even consider it."

Mordin shook his head, "Checked data. Reviewed scans and compared to known diseases. No correlation with _any_ known entities."

The smile slid from Shepard's face and she placed her cup down on the table, "You can't be serious..."

"Not fake, real."

Unsure of what else to do, she leaned back in her chair, her gaze trailing up towards the ceiling in thought. After a few moments to mull over this information, she returned her attention to Mordin, "Well, then. I'm a physician, not an epidemiologist. Where do we go from here?"

Pleased that she was eager to collaborate, Mordin leaned forward excitedly with wide eyes, "Must locate and investigate source of outbreak. Who is patient zero? Where had they been when they caught infection? Modes of transmission? Who is most at risk? Must acquire clinical data from patient observation."

"And then?" She asked.

"Throw proverbially darts until cause found. Implement control measures." Mordin answered this as though it should have been obvious. Shepard gave him a good, long look.

"Alright… but, I need to go back to something. For a germ to jump species, even species on the same planet—it's extremely rare. To be the patient zero from a species-to-species plague is like winning the worst lottery ever. According to the reports, this thing effects nearly everyone: batarian, elcor, krogan, drell, turian, asari, volus, hanar, salarian… not only is this jumping species, it's jumping levo/dextro. What are the chances of something like this just _happening_?"

Mordin smiled knowingly, as though he had anticipated for her to ask this question, "Naturally occurring? Odds less than .01%."

"Then what you're saying is…"

"Biologically engineered pathogen."

"Well, I'll be damned." She answered slowly. She clasped her chin between her forefinger and thumb and began to think. "Well, then, the obvious question is who and for what purpose? We can already discount the krogan—"

"Scientists too inept." Mordin agreed, "As is the case for the drell, hanar, elcor, and volus. Asari, salarian, and turian scientists unlikely to create or release weapon that would impact their own. And batarians—"

"Have the scientists, disregard for life, and motive to engineer such a thing… but, would have been more likely to hit a colony—not Omega." Shepard finished for him. She had known the salarian for quite some time and had grown accustomed to his preferred method of verbal brainstorming. The man was brilliant, but quite… verbose during his deduction process.

"Precisely!" He stated, "Which leaves those unaffected: humans and vorcha."

Shepard's lips pursed to the side and she continued to squeeze at the skin of her chin, "Well, I'm nearly certain that the Alliance has the _capacity_ to make this thing… but to what end? Maybe, and I mean _maybe,_ if they had deployed it on a batarian-dominant planet, I would agree…"

"Perhaps Alliance defector? Terra Firma sympathizer? Cerberus?" Mordin piped.

"Yeah, I suppose those are definitely possibilities we should keep in mind. But in the meantime, that leaves the vorcha as the only other species that are unaffected…"

Mordin and Shepard paused momentarily in this verbal tug-of-war to stare at each for a single moment… before simultaneously busting out into bouts of laughter. The idea of a vorcha being interested in science was as ludicrous a notion as expecting the heavens to rain cookies soaked in pickle juice—it just didn't happen. It was no secret that the vorcha never developed space-faring vessels as the other species had done, but rather, found their way off-world as stowaways on visiting ships.

"Hmpf! Vorcha so intellectually deficient, even evolution gave up on species." Mordin reminded her. Shepard snorted, though she admittedly felt guilty for doing so.

"It only makes sense that they would not be affected by a plague, especially if they had lived on Omega their entire life. Their non-differentiated cells make them immune to just about everything under the sun…" She paused momentarily and scrubbed a hand down her face, "What a mess. If this really is something new, I'm grateful that you're along for the ride… speaking of rides, what time is it? Aria's men should be coming."

"Current time is 04:22. Which case will she have us begin with?"

Shepard blushed, "I admittedly didn't get a chance to take a look at the files, busy night. You know how it is… The man we'll be looking caught the disease two—or, rather three now—days ago. Supposedly, it's one of Aria's top men." She rose from her seat in order to rinse the now empty cup.

"Ah, yes. Per'mon, Bray; age 37."

"What can you tell me about his file?"

"Prior to succumbing to plague, was in usual state of good health. Off-world ten days prior to experiencing start of symptoms. Initial symptoms comparable to typical viral infection. Fever with chills. Headache. Vomiting. Complaints of sore throat and cough. Aside from onset of hemoptysis appearing after only two days of infection rather than five to six, symptoms typical to others. Wife documents bleeding gums and stool."

"Did Aria's preliminary scans have a CBC?" Shepard asked, washing the mug now. Perhaps the complete blood count would help her understand what she was facing.

"Platelet count below 20k."

Shepard held up a finger to her lips, "The patient's batarian, right? Well, that platelet level in a batarian would explain some of the symptoms. What's his ANC looking like?"

"Absolute neutrophil count low. Less than 1000."

This stopped Shepard short, "Are you kidding me? It had only been two days! If this information is accurate—"

"Omni-scans always accurate-" Mordin attempted to jump in.

"Well, either way. We're going to have our work cut out for us on this one."

"Will my presence be an issue for Aria?" Mordin asked, head cocked curiously.

"She said you could come along 'if you must'… But, on the Citadel, I made my living in the emergency room. Bioengineered disease is your bag, if Aria thinks I'm going to pull a miracle out of my butt without help- well, she'll be left staring at my ass for a long time. I couldn't care less if she gets mad, the patients are my priority."

Mordin gave her a proud smile, "Spoken like a true doctor."

Shepard returned the smile and made a twirling motion with her hand, "With that said, do you mind if I get properly dressed? We're going to have a long day ahead of us. I'm sorry I'm so scatter-brained, I wasn't expecting you to come and I'm running on a handful of hours' sleep."

Once again, Mordin nodded and she stood to retrieve a clean shirt, bra, and underwear from her closet. However, it seemed that her hectic lifestyle had caught up with her, and she had entirely run out of clean jeans to wear. Since she had little inclination to strut about the streets of Omega in just a lab coat and her underroo's, she scooped up the used pair of jeans she had worn the night before. She brought all of this back to the bathroom where she began to change. As she did the famous wiggle, the one every woman does to get into a pair of form-fitting jeans, she saw something flutter out of the corner of her eye and land on the cracked linoleum. After zipping up and buttoning her pants into place, she bent over and scraped the slip of paper that had fallen off of the floor.

It was then that Shepard realized she had never truly looked at the drell's business card before. As she clasped it between her fingers, she read what had been emblazoned into the thick paper:

 _For when you come to your senses_

 _Contact: XXX-XX-XX-XXX_

Hesitantly, she slipped the slip of paper back into her jeans and glanced quickly towards Mordin, who was still politely staring dead center at his omni-tool.

"Hey, Mordin?" She called, her voice low. He made a noise in the back of his throat to indicate he had heard her. "Has there been any… headway in the way of resurrection?" As the words came out, she cringed at how dumb it sounded.

"Resurrection, as in reviving patients? Absolutely. Patients capable of revival up to two whole hours after being declared dead. Must have physician present—drugs to slow down cell death. However, resuscitation for out-of-hospital death's survival rate non-existent." He rattled off proudly.

"How about years? Is it possible to revive someone after years?"

Mordin's laughter was abrupt, a knife to the chest, "Was unaware that you were writing science-fiction novel, Shepard."

Her heart plummeted: a mixture of disappointment and embarrassment settling into the pit of her stomach. It really had been a stupid question, what was she thinking? She covered up these insecurities with a fake laugh, "Ha! You caught me. I thought that I would get myself some credits by writing the next big blockbuster. You know how popular teen paranormal romance is. Nothing flies off the shelves like a romance between a clumsy, insecure girl and a sexy, emotionally-stunted man."

"Will never work. Market oversaturated."

She felt a mischievous smile cross her face, "I'm sure with our combined brain power, we can come up with a unique gimmick. Think about it, Mordin, we'll be rolling in the dough!"

Mordin took a brief moment to answer, as though the thought of creating a story really did appeal to him, however he answered with, "No… No. No, no, no. Have other priorities. Patients to heal. Plagues to investigate."

Shepard blew a raspberry at Mordin, "You spoil all the fun."

In comparison to the photo that Aria had supplied in the file, Bray Per'mon was… well, not in great shape. Being sick had thinned out his face drastically, leaving the leathery skin to cling desperately to the bones and muscle. The adipose tissue surrounding the ocular region had eroded away, leaving the four onyx black eyes to bulge painfully from their pale sockets. Sprawled pitifully across the bed Aria had provided him in his private quarantine, he looked like he was staring death right in the face. His skin sparkled in the overhead lights from the sweat that coated his dehydrated body. A glance at his monitor showed that he had a fever of 38.6 Celsius and tachycardia.

Unfortunately, their initial immediate care was limited to a saline IV, oxygen and some basic medigel until they could figure out the root of the problem. Emma drew the blood that Mordin inevitably used to pinpoint the root of problem: a wormlike bacterium that infected the patient's white blood cells—just as he had predicted in her apartment. As Mordin set to work with this new piece of information in the next room, Emma continued caring for the unconscious batarian. A tongue depressor and some clever maneuvering allowed her to see that the dark interior of his mouth was coated with countless white plaques. Esophageal candidiasis—an opportunistic infection, not a symptom (unlike just about everything else the poor man had suffered). Emma clucked her tongue and made a note on her clipboard that an oral antifungal would be needed to combat the infection.

She stepped away momentarily and surveyed the room. The building Aria had decided to house the batarian proved how well she had thought of him. Clearly, she knew enough about controlling disease that she knew he must be quarantined like the people she trapped in the Gozu district's ghetto, but she wanted him to be comfortable. The building was composed of two rooms, an airtight room that he lived in and the room that led to the outside of the facility, with a decontamination chamber separating the two. Near his bed was a hazards bin filled nearly to the top with tissues speckled with blood from whenever he coughed. Emma grimaced as she completed her evaluation of the man, glancing down at the notes she had made to ensure no errors had been made.

She reviewed his recent history in particular. He had been off-world, meeting a contact of Aria's on Lorek of the Fathar System. No, he did not come in contact with any wildlife (a statement confirmed by the fact that he didn't so much have a single mosquito bite). No, he had not had sexual relations with any strangers. Yes, he did have sex with his wife prior to symptom onset, but no, she did not and still hasn't experienced any symptoms. He didn't eat any food out of the ordinary or come in contact with so much as a simple sneeze. It was frustrating for Emma to not have a single hint as to how he could have gotten infected. It was apparent by the increase in cases in the quarantined area, that the disease was transmissible in one way or another. But, if it was sexual—how could he have gotten it? If it had been water related, how could Aria so neatly contain it? If it had been airborne, how did Bray catch this thing if he was off-planet? If! If! If!

At the very least, she was content to see that the scanner showed improvement in his vitals since she first arrived. However, she felt her lips tighten when she glanced back at the IV she had inserted. Surrounding her neat little needle were several track marks that were too difficult to ignore.

"Doctor Shepard!" Mordin's voice pulled her attention away momentarily. "Take look."

Shepard straightened herself up and excused herself from the patient's room. She entered the decontamination chamber and shed the hazmat suit she had donned as soon as she had entered the facility. When she was able to make her way to Mordin, who was still glued to his monitor, she noticed row upon row of repeating symbols.

"What's that?" She asked, leaning an elbow against his shoulder as she read through the repeating code.

"Watch." He ordered. He clicked a button and the symbols gave way to multi-colored waves. Emma squinted.

"That looks like a DNA sequence." Her tone was unsure.

"Exactly. Managed to isolate bacterial DNA."

"Alright, I get that… But, I don't know what you want me to see."

"To normal viewer, genetic sequence seems satisfactory. But, work on genophage taught tricks. Watch." His fingers flew over the keyboard in a blur. Once again, the data displayed on the monitor faded and was replaced with repeating numbers. Ones and zeros.

"Okay, so you converted the nucleotides from A, C, G, T to binary code—but, I don't read binary code, so cut to the chase." She answered, her eyes fruitlessly scanning the dizzying amounts of 1's and 0's.

"Ran DNA sequence through VI interpreter to separate artificial strands from natural. Initially meant to discover what creators made. However," he inhaled deeply and shut his eyes, "VI picked up a primer sequence, not phenotypically displayed in bacteria. Recognized the code, similar to work on genophage. A message. Trapped within the DNA. Technique used for centuries. Simple to decode after finding it."

She sucked in a gust of air, "What does it say?"

"Unsure yet. Waited for you before sending to translator." For the first time since she had left Bray's side, she saw Mordin spare a glance in her direction. She stared into the massive blood orange and black orbs. She could hardly believe this was real. This wasn't the type of thing she could work on, this is the kind of baloney that belonged on cryptic message forums and creepy pastas, not in her patients. But… looking back on her patient, she can't recall learning about a single virus was that was able to debilitate a normal, healthy adult within three days. She felt like the medical reincarnation of James Bond.

Her answer was a single nod. Mordin returned his focus to the console and moved the sequence to another program. The program spit out a string of letters that made little sense to her. She squinted at the string on nonsensical words, as did Mordin, who raised a finger to tap his lips pensively.

Then, it hit her. "That word! There—" she pointed at a spot on the screen, "I recognize that word! The message is written in Batarian. Put it through a Batarian translator."

He did as she asked. When the computer spat out the answer, they shared yet another uncomfortable glance. After a few seconds, Emma threw her hands up in the air.

"You know," she said with an agitated sigh, fingers clasped about the bridge of her nose, "One of these days—I swear to you—one of these days, something will start making sense, and- just you watch—on that day, I will just keel over and die from the shock."

In his normal way of comprehending information, Mordin felt the need to read the brief message out loud, "Bray—Permon—We—Are—Watching."

* * *

 **Author's Note: Hello everyone! I hope you guys had a good couple of months since my last chapter. For those of you out of school, happy summer! For those of you still in school, good luck on finals/tests :D**

 **Now that it's summer for me, I can't wait to spit out new chapters and take this story further! Let me tell you guys, I had a lot of fun doing background research for this particular chapter (seriously, this entire thing was written in like, 200 word increments because I would keep getting distracted)! I included a couple of things I found interesting, in case anyone was interested!**  
 **I'm excited to release new chapters and unravel the mysteries!- thank you to everyone who takes the time to read, comment, subscribe- much, much, much love 3 3!**

 **Disease transmission: (CPG Grey- Americapox)**

 **Mordin/Shepard dialogue regarding plague: Mixture (Re-watching Let's Plays from that mission and Mass Effect Wiki) (Journal of Virology- Hemorrhagic Fever: Cellular Responses, Virus Load, and Nitric Oxide Levels). ( - Symptoms and Stages of HIV)**

 **DNA Message- believe it or not, this is a real thing that can actually happen now! ( - Researchers storing information securely in DNA)**


	9. Chapter 9

Garrus, seated on his black leather couch, was staring at long string of numbers and characters. He had been for a while.

Each time his talon reached out to activate the "call" button, he found a pang of anxiety shoot down his spine and inevitably, he would curl the aforementioned appendage into a tight fist. His ambivalence came not from fear of the person on the other end of the line, but rather from doubt regarding involving himself in Emma's drama. It wasn't that he didn't want to be helpful—far from it! This uneasiness only began to settle into his gizzard when he decided to call Wrex… only to find him doubting his prior judgement. What if he was wrong? What if Butler had misremembered the name on her shirt? He was basing everything off of the fragment of a memory… from Butler.

But… he needed information. Lots of information, in fact, and Emma was in no position to give him that. It was no secret that the girl was a vault—presumably as much of an enigma to him as he knew his position as Archangel made him to her. This girl—this sweet, fearless, patient girl—well, she was less of a person and more of a mystery. But what Garrus enjoyed the most was that each conversation permitted him a new piece of the puzzle that was Emma, and he couldn't wait for the day when he saw the whole picture, the whole _her_ —to unravel the riddle that was Emma Shepard.

Quite frankly, it was like being aboard the Normandy all over again.

Now, however, however was not the time to play games. She had gone through enough last night and, even if he felt headstrong enough to pester her with personal questions, she was at work. He had learned over the course of their relationship that she never answered her phone during a shift unless it was an emergency (which, in his line of work, was fairly frequent).

In the end, he knew he had no choice but to give in and make the call. He did so, but not without a deep, reluctant sigh. The omni-tool rang a handful of times and he had half a mind to simply cancel the call, get up, and go about the 101 things he should have been doing that day. However, just as he was about to give in to the temptation, the cheery chirps from his wrist were interrupted with the growl of a gruff, dissatisfied voice.

"Who is this?" Wrex's voice boomed. The vid connection between the two omni-tools had apparently not been established yet.

"Wrex? It's Garrus." Garrus introduced himself, shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

"Vakarian?" Wrex asked, sounding suspicious.

"The one and only… I heard you're on Tuchanka now? How have you been?" Garrus said, unsure of the best way to approach the topic at hand. At that moment, Wrex's image blinked into view. The krogan assassin gestured to the dismal surroundings around him.

"I'm sitting on top of a radioactive pile of rubble, surrounded by a planet full of pissed off krogan, thresher maws and -worst of all—pyjaks. How do you think I'm doing?"

"Sounds like just another day compared to what we went through together." Garrus answered lightly, wondering half-heartedly if a planet full of krogan could truly compared to the horrors of the Thorian on Feros or the geth attack against the Citadel.

"Why are you calling? We haven't spoken in the two years since Shepard died and now you want to shoot the breeze? I don't buy it."

Garrus expected something along those lines to be said, and he knew that he could stall no longer, "Right to the chase. That's what I always liked about you Wrex." Garrus paused for one heartbeat longer than he intended to, "I need to know what you know about Shepard's sister."

He heard a confused grunt at the other end of the line, "Shepard had a sister?"

Garrus felt a tight cord pull between his shoulder blades as his back stiffened. This was the answer he had been hoping _not_ to hear but pressed on anyway. "There's no reason to pretend that you don't know her. I met her."

"Listen, Vakarian, I got to get going. I have clan heads I need to meet" Wrex leaned forward to disconnect the call. Garrus had to act and he had to do it quickly.

"Wait!" He called hastily, "I need your help. Someone is threatening her."

This gave the krogan pause, "Someone's threatening Emma?"

BINGO. The older alien had fallen into the trap. Garrus felt his mandibles pull outward and knew that his hunch had been right. He had been cautious to never use Emma's name, but there Wrex was, calling it perfectly.

"Yes, and I need help putting together the pieces." He explained.

"Then I'm going to disconnect. I'll hire a transport to Omega as soon as possible."

Garrus waved his hands with mild agitation, "That's not necessary. She's fine for now, I'm keeping a close watch, but things are… complicated."

Wrex's hand cut through the air impatiently, "A 'close watch' isn't good enough for me. You weren't there. You say you met her. Great. But, I know for a fact that you weren't there for her when Shepard died. You didn't see what she became. I made her a promise that I would take care of her. If something's happening to her, I have a right to know.

His brow plates slid upward in surprise. Garrus expected Wrex to be secretive, but…. This? Suddenly, the situation felt less like a conversation with his former comrade, and more like a conversation with Emma's over protective krogan uncle. Uncle Wrex. Spirits. What had he gotten himself into?

"That's not necessary. I'll try to cut to the chase, but the whole thing is complicated. I'm not trying to beat around the bush."

Wrex rolled his eyes, "Sure could have fooled me."

"Like I said, it's difficult to explain because even she doesn't know the full scenario herself. You know how the Alliance never found Shepard's body after the attack?" There, that seemed like a good place to start.

"Of course."

"Well," Garrus said, "That's because it was stolen. We're unsure of the who, but we know that the why is because they're using the corpse for experimentation."

"What does this have to do with Emma?" Wrex pressed, his impulsiveness demanding that Garrus get to the point.

"Well, that's the thing. They're using it for experimentation… and they're sending the pictures of his body to Emma. The messages are vague, but the gist of it all is that someone knows about Shepard and that same person is stalking her."

Wrex's face scrunched with rage and the vidcon's screen suddenly blurred out of focus. A loud wallop and the sprinkling of grey mortar around the krogan told Garrus that Wrex had struck a nearby pillar with his gauntleted fist. When he came back on screen, he barked, "Those sons of bitches. I knew she wasn't cut for the Terminus systems."

"It… gets worst." Garrus admitted, "She recently got contacted by an entirely different group, saying that if she cooperates with them, they'll allow her to see Shepard again. Apparently, their end goal is to resurrect Shepard."

"How long has this been going on for?" Wrex asked, large head cocked.

"Supposedly for a few months, but I only found out myself last night—That's why I called now." Garrus confessed. Through his time on the Normandy, he knew that the best way to get what you wanted from Wrex was to be direct, to take the blows of his anger as they came, but to be honest the entire time. Any perceived notion of duplicity would only rouse the irritable alien's anger. The interaction between Wrex and Shepard on Virmire taught him that.

"Why admit this now?" Wrex asked, he seemed to be settling into whatever throne he had made for himself there on that piece of rubble he called a planet. The movement comforted Garrus, as it meant that Wrex intended to keep the line of communication open.

"She had been hiding this from me for a while. Last night, she finally met with the contact. I saw it and she filled me in." Garrus answered. This got a chuckle out of Wrex.

"Humans really don't ever change, do they? Yeah, that sounds like her. She always wanted to handle things on her own." Wrex reflected with an amicable tone. Garrus found himself leaning forward, intrigued.

"So, you've known her for a while?" Garrus interrogated, "I was hoping to ask you some questions—it might help me find a lead on who's doing this."

"Emma? Sure, we go way back. If it's for her, I'll answer what I can." Wrex answered, "But shouldn't you be asking her?"

"I told you, the situation is complicated." Garrus's mandibles snapped tight at this. Wrex remained quiet for a moment.

"She doesn't know you're talking to me, does she?" Wrex's tone implied that he did not approve of this fact.

Garrus leaned back again, attempting to maintain a cool composure, "No. She doesn't, and I would appreciate if it was kept that way. I'm not looking to hurt her, I just want to catch the bastards that have been harassing her. If I find them, I promise you that anyone looking for the culprits will have to suck them off the pavement through a straw to get the remains."

This got an even larger laugh out of Wrex, "Now, _that_ is something I can get behind. Maybe you're not so bad, turian. Alright, I'll bite. What do you want to know?"

"Well, I guess I should start at the beginning. How do you know her?"

"Met her about a decade ago, which would have made her…" Wrex (somehow) counted on his fingers. How he managed this, Garrus would never know, as the alien only had three of them, "twenty-one? Twenty-two? Whatever, it doesn't matter. We met on the Citadel after she left Elysium."

"Why does that planet's name sound familiar…?" Garrus asked, rubbing his mandible.

Wrex rolled his eyes, "That's where the Skyllian Blitz happened. Get your history straight! Sheesh. And they say we krogan are uncultured."

"Are you're saying that Emma was on the colony during the Blitz?" Garrus asked interestedly. He knew that this had nothing to do with the task at hand, but he found himself being sucked into the gossip. He remembered her mentioning the Skyllian Blitz being last night as the mission that made Shepard so famous. In the middle of her story, he never thought to ask if she had been involved as well. But… now that he thought about it, it made sense. As he prepared to join the Normandy, he soaked up all available information on Shepard. The reports stated that Shepard had been on shore leave when the Bltiz happened. Now, Garrus realized that Shepard's presence there hadn't been _so_ coincidental after all.

"Yeah, and don't expect her to talk about it either. Known her nearly since she set foot on the Citadel and I still don't know the full story. From what I understand, a batarian blew her school to bits. She wanted to go somewhere safer and used up all her creds transferring to the Citadel. That's when we met. She couldn't afford to keep in contact with her brother, so she went to Chora's Den everytime they had Alliance night to get news. One of the patrons mistook her for the entertainment and got handsy… and she made sure he never did that again." Wrex was smiling, the memory clearly playing in his head.

"What did she do?"

"Gave him a headbutt that any krogan worth his quad would be proud of. Couldn't _not_ buy the kid a drink after that. We've kept in contact ever since. Anytime I was in the Widow system and needed patching, I went to her. That's how I found out who her brother was. Stumbled drunk into her apartment while he was visiting."

The conversation was veering into what Garrus felt was pivotal to the mystery, "Do you know if anyone else knew about their relationship? Whoever's threatening her clearly either knew them before Skyllian Blitz or had to have access to scrubbed data."

At this, the krogan rubbed the massive skull plate on the top of his head, "Ehh, aside from the asshats bunkered in the Citadel Tower? I couldn't tell you. All I _can_ say is that after I joined the Normandy, the Commander made a big show of telling me not to mention anything—which I'm breaking now. But, I guess now that he's dead, the point is moot."

"What about enemies? Did she seem to have anyone that disagreed with her?"

"Emma's always been smart, knew not to put her nose where it didn't belong. She had her fair share of patients that would give her a hard time, but no one that would be able to steal Shepard's body out from under the Alliance's nose. The closest thing I can think of is that she once turned Barla Von down. Heh, poor pyjak didn't realize she wasn't the type to be persuaded with money."

"Barla Von, as in, the Shadow Broker's agent on the Presidium?" Garrus asked. Things were coming back much more smoothly for him. He felt like he was back at C-Sec. Apparently, this job was much like riding a bike, just needed to get some practice in. Without the red tape and hindrances, it had been quite some time since Garrus thought to ask questions first and pull out guns later.

"That's the one. He was my contact on the Citadel when the Broker hired me to take out Fist."

"Do you think that the Broker could possibly have a hand in all this?" Garrus asked, heart freezing over.

"If someone went through the Shadow Broker to take a hit out on her, she would be dead now. The Broker deals in information. He wouldn't hire someone to outright bother her for no reason. But, if you meant stealing the body, it's… possible." Wrex answered slowly, as though mulling over the scenario in his head.

"Thank you for your help, Wrex. It's actually given me a few more threads to follow than I could have hoped." Garrus answered honestly. He found himself feeling significantly more confident than he had been just a few minutes ago. With this boost, he found himself settling more comfortably into his sofa.

"Just answer me one thing. I know the kid. She wouldn't just tell anyone about her and the Commander. What's the deal between you two?" Wrex asked curiously.

Well, there went Garrus's newly found comfort.

Somewhat anxiously, he answered, "I guess you could say we're dating."

Wrex barked out a laugh, "Good one! You almost got me. Who says turians don't have a sense of humor?"

"Just like everything else, the… minutiae of it all is a bit convoluted, but… it isn't a joke. As of last night, Emma and I are… well, we're something."

The laughter died out immediately, "I thought I raised that girl better than that… going for a turian. What was she thinking?"

"I wonder that myself. Though, I'll say that nothing tops what I went through last night." Garrus found himself confessing.

Wrex leaned in closer to the camera. The decrepit conditions that he lived in were blocked from view as his large head took up the majority of the screen, "You know Vakarian, I might be on Tuchanka, but I think it goes without saying that if I catch wind that you hurt the girl, I'll find you and use your intestines as a jump-rope."

"Duly noted, thank you for that, Wrex."

The krogan _hmpf-_ ed and leaned backwards, proud that his point had been made. "So, she doesn't know that you're speaking to me… You said things were complicated. Does she even know you served with Shepard?"

Garrus rubbed the knuckle of his thumb across his crest, "Let's just say we haven't gotten to that part of the relationship yet."

"And she's okay with all this?"

"Surprisingly," Garrus answered, "Yes."

"You got a quad Vakarian," Wrex chuckled, shaking his head, "But you better pray that they don't bring John back."

And with that, Wrex disconnected the call.

Pacing, pacing, Pacing. Up, down, up, down. Back and forth. To and fro. It was nearly impossible for her feet to stop. The only respite in the monotonous pace would be the occasional frustrated scrunching of her frayed ponytail. She loved a good riddle, but she currently felt like she working on a puzzle that only had half of the pieces. Normally, this would be fun, but with several lives on the line, it was absolutely maddening.

"Alright, let's just… Let's just go over everything—from the beginning," She declared after several minutes of agonizing silence. "There's a plague affecting Omega and _only_ Omega. So far, Aria managed to quarantine the spread, with only a single outlier. An outlier who was no where _near_ the quarantine, prior to succumbing to it."

Mordin, who was still tending to his samples with all the diligence of a mother hen, nodded, "Correct. Though patient symptoms evolved rapidly, scans verified same disease is inflicted."

She nodded in agreement, "Right, right. So, we found the bacteria—the bacteria that's causing the plague—in the patient's blood. From that bacteria, we can determine with a 100% certainty that the bacteria was bioengineered and more processed than batarian fast food."

"Also correct," Mordin acknowledged, his focus set on his hands. After a few seconds, he withdrew the Vacutainer Heparin tube that held the patient's viscous, garnet-colored blood from the centrifuge, "Was correct in my hypothesis. Data shows elevated levels of cytokines and nitric oxide. Leukopenia result of apoptosis. Would also like to add that degenerate neutrophils present."

Emma flapped her hand dismissively at the last statement, "That doesn't matter, that doesn't matter. That would just tell us to look for an infection. How are my petri dishes doing?"

The two doctors huddled around the plates, where she was testing antibiotic resistance. Despite the variety of drugs she had set, the bacteria didn't respond to any. There were no circles indicating a zone of inhibition. Mordin clucked his tongue disapprovingly and her hands began rubbing her face with mild irritation.

"Ain't that a bitch?" She cursed. She pointed an accusatory finger at the shallow cups of agar, "These fuckers are good. They're _really_ good. Alright. Let's get back to this. We know that it cannot be volus, hanar, drell, krogan, elcor, quarian or vorcha- backed organizations producing this."

"Correct." Mordin agreed.

"But, batarian, human, asari, salarian, and turian run organizations _do_ have the skill and resources to make this." She stated, writing the names on a data-board posted on the far wall. Everything felt too nebulous. She needed to _see_ her data, needed to stare at it, in order to better process the information.

"Now, we can't just look at this as though it was a general bioterrorist attack because we know it isn't. Our patient's name is clearly defined in a strand of DNA—which is _fucking insane_ —but, I digress. We initially thought this was just a random attack, but now the parameters of the mission have changed."

"Precisely." Mordin seated himself in a rolling chair. He toed the ground in order to slowly rotate it to face her.

"Alright, now here's where it gets murky. We know that the message, along with the name, encoded in the DNA was in Batarian. Is it safe to presume that batarians are the creators?" She asked, pen poised on the board.

"Not at all." Mordin answered. This almost caught her by surprise.

"What's the rationale?"

"Batarian is victim. Perhaps the creator intended to send a message?"

She rotated her wrist upwards at an angle, threw her head back and scrunched her nose, "Huh? How would that make any sense? How would the victim ever read this? Who would ever think that someone was so utterly insane that they would encrypt a message in DNA?"

Mordin blinked at her, then cocked his head to the side, "Simply one of many possible scenarios, Shepard. The creator might have sent it knowing that no one would decrypt message. If multiple individuals at play, the message could be for them. However, many killers known to send cryptograms to confuse investigators."

"That's… true. But, let's… let's just shelve that part for a while. Ultimately, what we need to know is that Bray Per'mon was directly targeted for an attack. Unfortunately," She shot a glance through the decontamination chamber that separated the lab from the patient's room. Per'mon was still deeply asleep, his monitor providing constant background noise while they worked. "He claims that he had not had any recent altercations."

On the board, she found herself scrawling: _Personal or strategic?_

Without facing Mordin, she asked, "What can you tell me about bioterrorism?"

"Most major recent attack by Jath'Amon. Batarian extremist on Citadel. Intended to wipe out Citadel Council with Batarian made, bioengineered disease. Quick incubation. Near 100% fatality rate." Mordin recited.

Emma's eyes lit up, "Just like this one!"

" _Only_ communicable in high concentrations. _Only_ through air transmissions. Less refined, genetically speaking." Mordin recited, tapping a finger on the screen displaying the genetic sequence for added emphasis.

"Damn. Okay, what other cases do we know about?"

"First major known bioterrorism attack on Earth occurred 200 years ago. Followers in new age cult dispensed _Salmonella_ in restaurants humans refer to as salad bars. Attack involved members carrying the bacteria in liquid medium. Spread disease over the food or poured into salad dressing. Several hundred infected, however no deaths."

"Oh yeah… I remember learning about that case. If I'm recalling correctly, those loons only did it to sway an election. The ironic part of that case was that the other voters suspected the commune had been up to no good and ended up voting in droves to ensure that the cult's plot was rendered useless…. But, at any rate, that definitely wouldn't be the case here. Ha! An election on Omega." Shepard mumbled the last bit beneath her breath. In the back of her head, Emma began to imagine what a democratic election on Omega would look like. She could imagine entering the booth, only to find one of Aria's henchmen keeping vigil. Knowing the Pirate Queen, the ballot itself would probably just say, "Aria". She didn't care much for rivals, both real or imaginary.

Mordin didn't answer, his attention too engrained in the data that finally finished processing. She sighed and her gaze upon Mordin was envious. She wished she could be more active in the ongoing search for answers but knew that any participation in his work would only hinder his progress. Genetics was of course taught in her schooling, sure, but c'mon! What could she possibly do to aid Mordin's research?

Restless, she searched for any outlet that would allow her to be productive. She found herself suiting back up in the large hazmat suit and entering the decontamination chamber. As she waited for the freezing antiseptic to spray her suit, she leaned against the wall, deep in thought. There had to be _something_ that both she and Mordin overlooked. Some part of the puzzle that had been skipped. _Something_. The creator was good, but they were ultimately a person. And everyone makes mistakes.

The doors for Bray's room slid open, and once again she was at her patient's side. His breaths came in shallow pants, but he was in less distress than before. It appeared that her anesthetic was working, after all. When Bray _had_ been conscious, he was a hassle, even in his crippled state. He was purposefully vague when it came to personal history and the reasons why became evident only after she had attempted to run an IV. His parenteral opium abuse had made the whole debacle a chore but she was pleased to see that the concoction of both Earth- and Kar'Shan-based drugs had finally permitted the patient some relief.

As expected, the vitals hadn't change much since she had last been in the room, but the little that they did move were in positive directions. She tried not to allow her hopes to get too high. Only time would tell her if the care would work. But, for the time being, she would check and recheck. She documented it all and jotted down orders for his wife to follow after Emma left for the night.

A cough brought her out of her work and she looked up to see Bray shuffling, his snores telling her that he was still blissfully asleep. She watched as he nuzzled the pillow, straining his neck at a peculiar angle that he somehow managed to find comfortable. She squinted… was it the lights… or…?

From the desk where she had been typing, she neared the patient, dropping her datapad onto his bedside table amongst his favorite possessions (which, of course were his Carnifex and Fornax- Clearly, a man of only refined tastes). She activated the flashlight function on her omnitool and stooped low to inspect the area. She had been right—what she saw was no trick of the dimmed overhead lights. Bray Per'mon had bruising, and a lot of it. The vomit-green and overripe-banana-brown splotches centered primarily near the convergence point of his perioral flaps beneath his chin.

She jerked back, picking up her datapad and sifting through the notes. This color of bruising on a batarian meant that the trauma had been inflicted four to eight days ago… but, the datapad here reaffirmed her earlier assertion that he had not been involved in any fights.

"Mordin," She called, "by any chance do we have carbon disulphide?"

"Checking data base… annnnnd…. Yes! Why do you ask?"

"Extract the blood into the solvent. I need you to run a GC/MS for me." She said, pulling on Bray's chin to evaluate the rest of his injuries. To the unqualified eye, the bruises seemed simply like irregular coloring on the batarian's neck, but Emma knew the sign of a strangle hold when she saw one.

"Give me a minute." Mordin muttered, more to himself than to her. She heard the muffled clanging of Mordin preparing the gas chromatography/mass spectrometer. As he carried out her request, she lost herself to thoughts of the bruise's implications. The location was incredibly suspect. If she had to take a guess, the perp who did this had to have been intimately acquainted with batarian physiology. The location was perfect enough to ensure control over the batarian's head, while also hiding any bruising that might have been inflicted using the batarian's own anatomy. Hell, Bray was such a junkie that he probably never even felt the bruising or even, attributed any soreness to something else.

 _Four to eight days_ … Emma checked the rest of his body for anything abnormal… _In terms of Bray's timeline, that meant than an altercation had occurred after his off-world mission by approximately two days before and before the onset of his symptoms by only one day._ She thumbed her lip, eagerly anticipating the results of Bray's gas chromatography.

She felt Mordin's gaze well before he spoke. She didn't need to look up to know that he stood just on the other side of the translucent partition, hands holding a datapad with the evidence.

"How did you know?" Was all the answer she needed.

So, Bray Per'mon _had_ been in an altercation within the last week. The reason why he thought any different was explained by the sleeping drugs present in his blood. Emma would bet her fluffy, pink pig slippers that he had been infected shortly after the soporific had knocked him into oblivion. She raised Bray's chin, allowing Mordin to see the faint hematoma.

"Here," She announced in a soft voice before gingerly dropping the batarian's chin back onto the pillow. She stepped back in order to recreate the scenario that the bruises revealed. She raised her left arm in a hooking motion, bringing her fist close to her right clavicle. The right hand came up from under and smothered her nose and mouth. "It would have been like this. They used their left arm to hold Bray in place and their right to press the drug to his mouth."

"Very interesting find, Shepard." Mordin complimented. He pulled up the data, "Hypothetically, if we use the known amount used to knock a batarian of patient's height and weight and the amount remaining in blood, half-life predicts that drug administered five days ago."

Shepard nodded, "That correlates with the age of the bruising."

Shepard picked up her datapad and scrolled through the data, hoping to find an outlier. If Bray was infected five days ago, that meant there were two days between inoculation and symptom onset. While Bray's conditions were picking up, she knew that he would have been dead by the end of the week without medical intervention. She waved the tablet at Mordin, who seemed as equally deep in thought.  
"I want to run something by you." She declared.

"Hmm?" Mordin hummed curiously.

"Aria has here that the first victim died about four weeks ago. If we use the data from the other victims as reference, we estimate that their symptoms manifested approximately five to six weeks ago. People in the quarantine zone take longer to die than Bray would without our intervention. We know that he was singled out as a target and that his plague is… well, more efficient, than the variant in the quarantine…"

"Thoughts are concurrent with yours so far." Mordin urged when she had paused.

"Mordin… I might be grasping at straws…" She felt her face scrunch up to reveal the self-doubt, "But what if the case in the quarantine zone was to gather baseline numbers and Per'mon was the first victim of the perfected virus?"

Mordin scratched his chin, "Entirely plausible, but impossible to confirm unless more data collected. Cannot afford to make presumptions. Bias may affect data."

"You're right. You're right. But we're going to have to get Aria to give us the get-go on going into quarantine zone." Shepard answered. She was stepping back into the decontamination chamber and removing her gear. As she waited for the cycle to finish, Mordin answered.

"Could always sneak in. Quarantine security issue minimal. _Am_ ex-STG, after all." Mordin reminded her, his hand ghosting over the spot on his hip where she knew his sidearm to be. Emma answered with the perk of her brow.

"Yeah? And get a bullet lodged in my ass? _No, thank you_. With batarians and turians dropping left and right from this thing, the Blue Suns are in a power vacuum with the vorcha. We won't be much help if we're too focused on dodging bullets. We need Aria's manpower on this one."

Mordin mulled over what she said and nodded, "Very true. Could actually use some time for self. Need to get back into lab, work with sample with own equipment. Can synthesize tissue better there."

"Alright then, should we call it a day?" Emma asked. Mordin gave a short nod and moved towards the table. Emma tagged along, assisting him by disposing of waste.

"Believe so. Wish to bring blood back to lab, can run simulations there. Efficiency and rapidity of virus suggest quick replication cycle. If hypothesis true, high mutation rate likely. Before entering quarantine, must characterize rate of spontaneous mutation. Will determine drug resistance. Can even shed light on how it manages to evade immune system." He answered.

"Do you want me to tag along?" She asked, placing a vial of clear liquid back onto his cart of supplies.

"No thank you. Should use time to train Daniel. This will be good practice for him."

"Sounds good. I guess I'll go report our findings to Aria. Any messages you want me to relay?"

Mordin sniffed, his eyes shutting dramatically, "Hurry."

After managing to wrangle the facility into some semblance of order, Mordin and Emma left the building together. Mordin bid her goodbye and left for his lab in a sky-taxi. She waved until his car turned a corner and zoomed out of view. Before leaving, she jerked her chin in the direction of the krogan bodyguard that Aria had hired to secure the facility. He grunted at her in response and resumed his uneventful post. After she was out of his sight, she activated her omnitool with mild dread, knowing it would be best to warn Aria that she would soon be coming. Emma sighed and opened up the chatroom.

 **[** _ **Connecting E_Shep to MaxKeeblesBigBoobs… Connecting… Connecting…. Connection Established]**_

 _ **E_Shep:**_ _Just finished up with Bray_

 _ **MaxKeeblesBigBoobs:**_ _And?_

 _ **E_Shep:**_ _There's a lot to discuss. We managed to stabilize him for the time being but without more research there's a limit._

 _ **MaxKeeblesBigBoobs:**_ _Thats not good enough._

 _ **E_Shep:**_ _We're working on it but for today we're done. I left instructions for his wife and body guard on the table (with my number) in case anything happens before I get back. Mordin insists he needs to return to his lab to finish up the work._

 _ **MaxKeeblesBigBoobs:**_ _And you?_

 _ **E_Shep:**_ _I'm on my way to Afterlife. Mordin and I found something... Something not good. But, you're going to want me to be present. Long story short is: Bray was targeted for this attack._

Emma was met with a longer wait than usual.

 _ **MaxKeeblesBigBoobs:**_ _Get here. Quickly._

 _ **E_Shep:**_ _Already on my way._

 _ **MaxKeeblesBigBoobs left the chatroom. One user remaining.**_

Emma smirked. That was… relatively painless. She followed Aria's suit and left the chatroom. As she was closing out, a blip on the notification bar told her that Beverly had sent her a message.

 _-[Beverly T. (PROVIDER OF FOOD)] 17:27_

 _What do you think of this? It's got a lot of foot traffic and the space is pretty cheap. I like it, but since it's in the Kima District, Talia is worried that clients will be afraid to go._

[The series of attached images were of the potential storefront that Bev was casing. Like just about everything in Omega, the exterior had a grimy steel appearance and questionable integrity. On the dirt encrusted window, a red and white sign proclaimed that the space was "FOR SALE". The inside was tighter than the restaurant they currently owned, but, overall it had more seating area.]

Emma snorted at this. To anyone outside the Terminus, the store seemed like a biohazard in the making… but, for Emma who had grown accustomed to the ghastly conditions, it was practically nirvana—especially if it was in the Kima district.

 _-17:27_

 _What's so bad about Kima? I would love to move out of the Carrd and into Kima._

 _-[Beverly T (PROVIDER OF FOOD)] 17:28_

 _Me too :(, but Talia says that since most of our patrons are involved in stuff that they won't want to come to the new store._

 _-17:28_

 _She doesn't think that you can get new customers?_

 _-[Beverly T (PROVIDER OF FOOD)] 17:28_

 _Boran and I are trying to convince her! She's being so stupid_

 _Are you sure you can't come? Maybe you can rattle the rocks in her head._

 _-17:28_

 _Sorry to disappoint my lovely food goddesses (and cashier god, if you're there reading this Boran Cal), but alas I am still tied up. Just finished with a patient in east Tuhi, but now I'm on my way to see Aria._

 _-.-_

 _I'll trade you my asari for yours?_

 _-Beverly T. (PROVIDER OF FOOD)] 17: 29_

 _HA! Not a snowball's chance!_

When she finished her back and forth with Bev, Emma found herself outside the stairs that would take her beneath the main Omega streets and into the subway. The interactive pillar to the immediate right of the station revealed that there was a bit of a wait before she could expect the 5, which would take her right to Afterlife. Rather than descending down into the lower level and whipping out her omni-tool so she could catch up on the latest chapter of her favorite smut, Emma's lips drew into an impish smirk. She removed the flip-phone from her waistband and dialed. It took a few seconds before she was greeted with the rumble of his voice.

"Everything alright?" He sounded concerned, but after last night, Emma couldn't blame him.

She let out a relieved laugh, "Yeah, I'm good. Just have some time to kill so I thought…" Realization dawned on her and she gasped, "You're not in the middle of anything, are you? I'm sorry I didn't even think to ask."

There was a chuckle on the other end of the line, "Don't worry, you're doing me a favor. The only thing you interrupted was some paperwork."

She smirked, "I thought the only reason you liked Omega was because you didn't have to worry about that."

"Paperwork isn't red tape. Just because my old managers aren't breathing down my carapace, doesn't mean I can get lazy."

Her eyebrows raised, "So, you had managers at some point? _Interesting._ "

"Perhaps I've said too much." The tone was light, playful though Emma could hear a hint of true concern.

"Nonsense. I think I already got your past laid out." She told him. While she waited for her train (and shamelessly flirted with the turian on the other end of the line), she leaned against the gum-coated cement barrier that bordered the entrance to the stairwell. As she did, she watched the denizens of Omega go about their lives.

"Let's hear your theory, then." He answered, bemused.

"I think before you came here, you were a politician." She pulled the phone away to disguise her giggles.

"If I didn't know any better, I would say you're trying to rile me up." He teased. The low hum of his voice did deliciously dangerous things low in her abdomen. When they first met, she was so entrenched in making sure he lived, that she ignored how delectable he sounded. A credit to her skills as a professional, surely.

"Only if it works," She purred, cupping a hand over her mouth. For just a moment, she forgot that she was on a public street in the middle of the Tuhi district. She glanced up, knowing she was at the very edge of the district. Just a street away, she could see Omega's orange backlit skyline. It was never quite night here, but it was certainly never day. Just outside the barrier, skycar's zoomed haphazardly.

"Always," He answered, before shifting the tone of the conversation, "But tell me, your clinic is never empty at this time. To what do I owe this pleasure?"

She snorted, "Aria."

"I'm rescinding my offer, then."

"No take backs," She tsked playfully, "In all of the… craziness of last night, I forgot to pass along some stuff."

"Ah, you always get some interesting leads. What do you have for us today?" He answered. In her mind's eye, she imagined him in an old-timey detective's hat, poised over a pen and pad.

"Nothing that I actually want you or anyone else to take part in." Out in public, she made a conscious effort to keep her statements vague.

"You don't have to pamper us. I hate to brag, but we are _pretty_ good."

"Against slavers and drug kingpins sure, but this is my domain. Aria found a new disease in Gozu. She thought she had it contained, but it turns out one of her men caught it. She hired me to investigate."

"So that's why the lower east Gozu has been so blocked off. We've been sniffing that area out for weeks." He answered.

"Well, sniff somewhere else. This thing is deadly and what's more," She found her head flicking back and forth as though expecting to catch someone in the shadows clinging to her every word, "My colleague and I think there's something much more sinister below the surface."

"Tell me." He ordered. Knowing that her train would be arriving soon, she gave him the Cliff Notes version. When she finished, he responded simply with, "Anything I can do from my end?"

"Know anyone that might be gunning for Aria? Bray is her right-hand, afterall." She asked.

"Emma, it's Aria. Someone is _always_ out to get her." Archangel reminded her.

"Couldn't hurt to ask," She answered with a shrug, forgetting entirely that he couldn't see her. "But anyway, I need you to tell your men that if they need any patch-ups, that I'll need a heads up. Until I'm done with this thing, I'm either going to be in the Tuhi or Gozu districts with Aria's guards. I'll need some time to slip past them."

"I'll keep that in mind. Where are you now?"

"Tuhi, but not for long. I'm actually waiting for the 5 so I can get to Afterlife. I need to debrief Aria."

"Can't say I envy you." He joked. She snorted, then a lightbulb went off.

"Hey! I just remembered, you told me about a human song that you liked, but never told me what it was. The wait is killing me! What was it?" Her eyes glanced up at the screen, dismayed by how little time she had remaining before she needed to board her train.

"I think it would be better if I showed it to you in person. Are you…" He cleared his throat, "free tonight? After Aria, I mean."

The question hit her like a ton of bricks, in a dazed voice she answered, "All clear."

"Alright then… I guess. I'll… uh… see you tonight."

"It's a date," She breathed with a happy sigh into the receiver, "Ooh, I'm going to have to go soon. My train is almost here!"

"Before I let you go. You sent me the letters you got, but not what I saw the drell hand you. Do you mind sending it along as well? It might help."

"Oh, yeah! Totally! But I really gotta run. I'll take a picture and send it when I get on the train."

"Good. Let me know when you're finished with Aria, I'll have a car pick you up from Afterlife. I'll see you tonight." He told her. Her heart nearly exploded.

"See you tonight!" She exclaimed before hanging up.

With an excited hop in her step, she raced down the flight of stairs, across the platform, and through the waiting doors of the graffitied train. With the promise of a date on her horizon, Emma felt too jittery to sit, despite the car she occupied being suspiciously empty. The doors closed, and she hooked her arm around the length of an aluminum pole as the train began to gather speed. Recalling her earlier talk with Mordin about producing a teen paranormal romance, she remembered that she had slipped the square of paper into her back pocket. She removed it from its hiding space and attempted to take a photo using the camera on the crappy burner phone she used to communicate with Archangel.

Admittedly, she was awful at using it, but when she was _seventy-five_ _percent_ certain she had managed to at least snap one solid photo, she tucked the paper into her bra.

She squinted at the phone's miniscule screen, attempting to discern whether or not she got what she needed.

Emma had been so preoccupied attempting to learn the ins and outs of the phone, that she never felt the presence sneaking up behind her.

Without so much as a peep, the crook of someone's left elbow hooked around the front of her throat, while their right arm snaked upwards underneath her own, holding a square of sweet-smelling cloth to her nose.


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Note: Hey all- so I have two things to apologize for. First off, this chapter is going to be a short little interlude because it was meant to be a part of the last chapter. I honestly thought about scrapping it entirely, but I really love the Nalah/Butler characters, so I decided to keep it anyway- even if it kinda doesn't fit...  
** **ALSO I'm so sorry for everyone that read the first rendition of the chapter. My friend got a new puppy today, and admittedly, I was so excited to meet the pupper that I didn't bother to check to see if the upload was successful. But thank you to ShiftingShadows963, InuGuardian1984, Orihime-San for letting me know! Look up respicefinemm on insta if you wanna see me get mowed down by a 40 lb pup**

The metallic doors of Nalah's apartment slid open, her husband striding through the doorway with enough energy radiating off of him to fill the room. Upon entering their living room, he toed off his boots in the front entrance and gave Nalah a toothy smile, "Lucy, I'm home!"

Nalah, who had been occupied prior to his arrival, shoved her project beneath the mud-brown cloth cushion of their sofa. With his attention devoted solely on removing his work gear on a table near the door, she focused on obscuring the deadly metal as best as she could before leaning forward and nabbing a sunset-pink candle off their maple coffee table. She twisted on the cushion, extending the candle out towards Butler with wide, doe eyes blinking innocently at her husband. Deep in her belly, her child gave an anxious kick at the deception.

"Hey honey, want to smell my latest creation?" She asked. Butler ambled casually towards her and perched his elbows on the spine of the sofa, leaning over her shoulder to give the rose-shaped wax an appreciative sniff.

"Smells great, baby." He pressed an enthusiastic kiss to her cheek and pushed away from the couch, "Did you get dinner?"

"I ordered some takeout out from that new seafood restaurant around the corner, "Frying Nemo." She answered passively, placing the candle back down on the coffee table amongst the others. To keep up the farce, she picked up her knife and yet another work in progress. She had been attempting to carve an elephant out of the wax, but her efforts were… not looking promising, to say the least.

"Did you get me anythin'?" his tone was hopeful as he made a beeline for the kitchen.

"No," she responded incredulously, "Why would I do that?"

"Cause you're supposed to love me!" He exclaimed, mock indignation lacing the words. She waited, listening for his response when he opened their fridge. There was a soft chuckle and the sound of crinkling plastic as he withdrew the Styrofoam from its hiding place. "Ya little lyin' hoe!"

"I don't know what on Earth you are talking about." Nalah replied, pressing the blade of the knife to the wax. She felt something pelt the back of her head, knocking it forward slightly. She belted out a burst of giggles as she reached behind her head to find the stale fortune cookie that Geoff had launched at her. She twisted as best as she could, aiming her counterattack at her husband, who of course, managed to duck gracefully out of its trajectory, leaving it to skid across the white tile.

"I'm sorry, did you learn to shoot at the Imperial Stormtrooper Marksman Academy? 'Cause that was sad." Geoff teased, popping his food into the microwave. He gave a little hop ad perched himself up on their black kitchen counter.

"Oh, shut up!" Nalah groused, a sore loser. Geoff laughed, his feet kicking playfully as he waited for the food to finish cooking.

"Don't worry, I love ya' anyway…" He paused thoughtfully, "Has our kid been treating ya' any nicer today?"

As though on cue, the baby gave another frightful kick to Nalah, creating yet another crater in her organs. She rubbed her belly, "No, your child has not been any nicer. In fact, your kid kicks my bladder one more time, we're going to start needing to buy diapers for me." She groaned.

"Why is this only my child now?"

She twisted slightly, leveling the carving knife at him in an accusatory manner, "Because only a pain in my ass this big could belong to you. We both know that my child would be a perfect angel."

Butler wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, "If ya' give me about twenty minutes and a bottle of lube, I can be an entirely different type of pain in your ass."

"Geoff!" Nalah chastised with a squeal, launching the lump of wax at her husband. Her 'wrath' apparently giving her the ability to land a shot at this knee. When she twisted to face him, cheeks ablaze with a furious blush, she found her husband watching her with the most adorable smile plastered to his face. The sparkle in his expression had her breathless- the way her eyes found his as he drank in the beauty of her reaction, she felt the warmth of their combined love fill her. They stayed that way for what felt like an eternity… until the microwave interrupted the moment.

Geoff pulled out the food from the microwave, grabbed a fork and resumed his perch on the counter, shoveling the food down his gullet.

With a sigh, Nalah shook her head. Geoff had many attractive qualities… the way he scarfed down food like he thought someone was going to take it away—yeah, that was not one of them.

For a while, there was silence and she took a small pleasure from the domestic bliss while her husband ate. After a bit, Geoff broke the quiet and pointed his fork at the entrance where two, thin, plain candles sat, "I see ya' set out candles for Emma and Garrus. I know that Garrus's black candle means protection, but what does Emma's mean?"

Without looking up, she answered, "Green is for emotional healing and acceptance. I prayed for new beginnings." She glanced up at the candles in question. The thin green piece sat on a clean candleholder alongside a long black strip. The paper she had laid down on the antique brass with Garrus and Emma's names was now smothered under the combined mixture of the melted wax- a prayer her grandmother had taught her long ago.

Speaking around the food in his mouth, Geoff whined playfully, "Where's mine? What am I, now? Chopped liver? I see how it is."

Nalah pointed at the other side of the room where a single candle was perched on their windowsill. The brass candleholder here was significantly different from the clean, yet clearly worn holders that she used for her friends. The metal on this one was caked in several layers of different colored wax, denoting the different types of prayers she had placed for him over the many years of their love. The older layers of pinks and reds yielded to silver (victory), deep violet (to drive away evil) and black (protection).

"Ah, there I am!" He quipped brightly. He dumped his finished meal in the trash and washed off the fork. "Actually, speaking of candles…"

"Hmm…?" Nalah hummed.

"Are we both gonna to continue to pretendin' that I didn't see you hiding somethin' in the cushion? I ain't no Yankee Candle, but I know for damn sure you don't need a detonator to make Pecan Surprise scented candles." He tsked.

"Ah, fuck." Nalah bit out with mild irritation. She put down the carving she had feigned interest in.

"Nalah," He began, his tone soft.

"I know, I know." She conceded. He walked behind her and began massaging her shoulders. She leaned back, staring up.

"We talked about this. Ya' can't just be doin' that kinda thing here anymore. We gotta start thinkin' about more than just you and me—"

He was right. She knew he was right. But, "I know, we agreed no more explosives or weapons in the house… but… I'm bored. This" She gestured to the candles, "this isn't me. I want to be back in the field. We made a great team."

Her husband's face was sympathetic, "I thought for sure you would like this candle makin' crap—figured you would like settin' things on fire." He announced, realizing now that she only had the supplies out to make her actions seem less suspicious for when he arrived home.

"For a little bit I did… but right now, the apartment smells like a eucalyptus tree's butthole and it doesn't give me the same thrill like when I make a 'toy'. I feel so useless. This mother goose thing isn't me. Meanwhile, you're out with Garrus and Emma's saving Omega from itself…" Her confession trailed off.

Butler made his way around the couch and flopped down, pulling Nalah tight to his chest and giving her a good squeeze. She curled as much as her belly would allow and pouted, enjoying the sensation of his fingers trailing through her hair.

After a few breaths, he relented, "Alright then. Well, I guess we don't gotta worry about grabby hands at this point in the game. Lemme get a good look at this bad boy." Nalah pulled back suddenly, her eyes alight.

"Really?" She asked, an ecstatic undercurrent lacing her words.

"Ya' better blow me away…" He thought about what he said for a second, before adding, "ah… figuratively, of course."

Nalah let out a high-pitched squeal and began fishing between the cushions for the metal contraption she had hidden. She surprised Butler by getting to her knees and pulling even more out from under the couch. When she returned to his side, she had several crude prototypes on display. All of them were constructed in the same bone shape with disconnected wires haphazardly sticking this way and that. She placed them in his lap for his analysis. He made a big show of inspecting the constructs, though deep down they both knew he hadn't the faintest idea of what he was looking at.

When she grew bored of this, she yanked the unfinished bomb out of his hands and shook it excited (an action that had Butler attempting to not shit his pants).

"Geoff, this might be my finest work yet! I'm going to talk to Garrus about this, but if you guys are ever against Eclipse or someone tech-savvy, this will be your golden ticket. It'll work somewhat like an EMP—completely fry out any sensors while leaving yours," She dropped low into a dramatic whisper, "completely intact. Slap this bad boy on a grid, and we're talking about killing power for half a district… Of course, it will also blow anything within a 10 meter radius to kingdom come… but," She scoffed haughtily, pretending to buff her nails on her shirt, "I could make something like that in my sleep. Only problem is that I can't get the omni-gel/nitroglycerin mixture to hold."

Geoff had nearly zero idea what she was talking about, but the way his wife's intelligence worked brought a smile to his face. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, "I love when ya' talk tech with me. You really outdid yourself on this one, I can't wait to see what the finished product looks like. Garrus will lose his mind." She beamed, placing the incomplete project on their table.

"Speaking of Garrus, Emma told me everything. Did he tell you? He finally made a move!" Nalah gossiped.

Geoff's response was distant and he pretended to brush the dust from an imaginary medal on his chest, "Yeah, I guess ya' could say that I was the one to convince him to go through with it."

Nalah smacked the offending hand playfully, "Liar!"

"What're ya' talkin' about! Of course, I did! That shit went on so long even I was startin' to get blue balls!"

"Bunch of dummies," She commented, her affection apparent.

"Ain't ya' glad we don't act that dumb?"

"We? What's this 'we'? No, it's me. I am the only that's not dumb out of the four of us."

Geoff looked pensive for a moment, which worried Nalah. Nothing intelligent ever came out when Geoff had been deep in thought.

"A turian and a human. My pa' would be rolling in his grave if he knew. Ya' think Emma always had a thing for 'em or Garrus is just like, an exception?" Butler asked, his hand stroking Nalah's long mane absentmindedly.

"I think she said she had a crush on Xal'Metor on The Enkindlers, so I guess we know for sure that she likes quarians."

"I guess Ems just got a dextro kink."

Nalah cleared her throat, "I don't think kinks work that way, honey."

Butler's head jerked to Nalah and he had a confused expression, "You think… I mean, do you ever wonder what it looks like?"

"What what looks like?" Nalah asked, her brows furrowed.

"You know… it… their thing…. The bauble."

Nalah shook her head, "What are you talking about?"

"A turian's… schmeckle. His baloney pony."

Nalah held up her hand, "Okay, stop. I get what you mean—"

"—His pied piper—"

"Geoff"

"His purple-headed yogurt flinger—well, I mean, I dunno if theirs is purple, per se… But—"

"EW!"

"Well, have you?" He asked.

Nalah shook her head once again, hair slapping the sides of her face furiously, "No, I haven't! I've never looked a turian and thought, 'hey, I would like to see his penis!' And before you ask, I haven't seen any other alien penises either. I don't know, and I don't want to know."

"But, aren't you a little curious. I mean, you and Emma watch all those shows…"

"That's not the same! They always cut away from the action! Everyone knows that the elcor actor isn't having sex with the volus in Heartwarming: I Love You!" The blush was rising up her neck and into her cheeks once again.

"Do you think… Do you think Emma's seen one?"

"She's a doctor, Geoff. She has to know their anatomy."

"Yeah, but it's usually locked away behind their plates. I mean, who here hasn't seen a turian without their clothes on? After moving to Omega, it's almost weird not to see at least one naked species on the way home from work. Everyone knows that it only comes out of their plates when they're aroused… Okay, now I just can't get my mind off it. I need to know!"

She watched as Geoff pulled out his omni-tool and began searching the internet.

"Oh my God. Geoff, Geoff what are you doing?" Nalah exclaimed, burying her face into his shoulder.

"I'm just logging onto Fornax." Geoff answered, scrolling through a series of videos. When he found one that seemed to sate his curiosity (Sandy Turian B!T(H with THiN Waist Gets PLOWED! !), he pressed the button and began the video.

Immediately after pressing the link, their apartment was filled with the ridiculously horrifying sounds of turian plates colliding loudly in a rhythmic pattern. The only noises punctuating the "crack, crack, crack" of pounding hips was the shrilly hissing noise that the turian female seemed to be emitting. This noise appeared to produce a desired, erotic effect on the turian male in the video—much to the dismay of Nalah and Butler. Allowing her curiosity to get the better of her, Nalah found herself sneaking a peak of the vid from behind her fingers, only to emit a loud gasp of horror as her eyes grew impossibly wide.

"Oh dear lord! Turn it off!"

Much to Nalah's chagrin, Butler was laughing maniacally, "Holy shit! Look at that thing!"

"NO!" Nalah groaned loudly, burying her face back into the safety of his shoulder.

The video reached a climax (or rather, the turian's reached his climax) and it was… traumatizing. The video concluded, ending with several links that the site seemed to think that Nalah and Butler would also 'appreciate"

The two sat in stunned silence for a single breath before Nalah grabbed the front of her husband's civvies and aggressively yanked him forward.

"Do you think Emma knows?"

"I—" Geoff began.

"I SAID DO YOU THINK EMMA KNOWS?!" Nalah screamed.

"I—I was kidding about before. I'm sure she does! Jesus, Nalah, you're scaring me!" He exclaimed, looking down at the tiny fist that had managed to yank him from his comfortable position.

"I need to warn her! I need to protect Emma! She needs to know!" Nalah began, now activating her omni-tool. Butler grabbed her arm in an attempt to get her to stop.

"Nalah, no."

"I need to!" Nalah scooched further down the couching, leaning her body away so that Geoff's grabbing hands wouldn't deactivate her omni-tool.

"Nalah! No, no, no, no, no, no, no! Please don't cockblock my boss, I'll never hear the end of it!" Butler was now attempting to crawl over Nalah's body (all while being very careful of the precious cargo in her abdomen).

At that moment, both of their omni-tools turning red and emitting the tell-tale SOS alert. They stopped their fighting and Nalah watched as Butler reactivated his omni-tool and paled.

"What is it?" She asked, her chest tight.

Butler looked up at Nalah, his face strained, "It's Garrus… Emma's… been kidnapped."


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's Note: Sorry, for the short chapter!**

Beep! … Beep! … Beep! … Beep! …

 _That sound… I know it…_ She thought groggily.

Beep! … Beep! … Beep! … Beep! …

She felt as though her brain had melted into mush. The moment she thought a thought, it appeared to vanish into the ethereal. Somewhere in her fog-filled head, she acknowledged that this sound was important… and yet, she was frustrated by the fact that she could not put meaning to this obscure noise. What the hell did beep, beep, beep mean? Cars. Cars? Cars beeped, right? No. That wasn't right. The pitch was all wrong. Too high. Shrilly. And hold the phone! They didn't make cars with horns in space. Cars only had horns on Earth where automation hadn't yet take hold.

Earth. She was from Earth. Right? Right. Was she on Earth now? No. She moved… she… was moved… to… goddamnit, where the hell did she live?

Beep! … Beep! … Beep! … Beep! …

No. 'Where did she live' was not the important question. Where the hell was she? That was the question—and—and! Who was going to turn off that fucking god-forsaken beeping? It was maddening! It was hard enough for her to think through this mud without the cries of some infuriating machine!

Beep! Beep! Beep!

It was only with the increase in the beeping's rate that it hit her—an electrocardiograph. She was listening to a beating heart.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Her next major revelation came shortly after.

She was a doctor. If she was hearing the bleating of an ECG, then she must be near a patient. But… unless, the patient was a salarian, that heart rate was racing far too quickly. Sinus tachycardia? Or, was it bradycardia? That always tripped her up in undergrad…

It dawned on her that she needed to pull her head out of the gutter. She had to fight through this fog so that she could attend her patient's needs (though, frankly, she could not recall actually having a patient). Someone out there needed her, and it was her duty to answer the call.

She opened her eyes. Or rather, she attempted to open her eyes. She felt resistance to the movement, as though the delicate lids had been pumped full of lead. Fruitlessly, she attempted to rock herself into a sitting position, but found that the same, cumbersome sensation had spread throughout the entirety of her body. This wasn't good. She had to take care of her patient. They needed her. If only she could get her limbs to… to…

Beep!Beep!Beep!Beep!

She didn't have any patients. She _was_ the patient.

Beep!Beep!Beep!Beep!

She didn't recall being sick. But… damnit! Now that she attempted to recall information, she couldn't even remember who she was.

Then, someone spoke, "Her… rate… accelerating."

The voice was distant, garbled. Not only were the words difficult to distinguish, but it sounded entirely as though they had been speaking from unfathomable depths. Her mind felt like soup. The intricacies of the voice were lost upon her. She couldn't determine just what the voice was: male or female? Human or alien? Young or old? Familiar or unrecognizable?

Beep!Beep!Beep!Beep!

"…Care…. it... Pay you… off your ass." This was a second voice. The dilemma that plagued the first voice carried over to this new one. Somehow, she knew that the words were being spoken by two different voices, but if you asked her how she knew, she wouldn't have been able to say.

"She… awareness. Conscious…" Answered a third.

Pain! There was a sharp, acute pain in her abdomen. It stabbed somewhere in the hypogastric region, a handful of centimeters below her navel. Whatever had her brain so addled did little to stem the red-hot agony that she now felt. The sharpness glided across her abdomen in a parade of pain. Small, shallow strokes. Slice. Slice. Slice. Each bite brought to life a bubbling warmth that gurgled momentarily in the dip before sliding across the plain of her stomach and down her sides. Drip, drip, drip, went the warmth.

With the dichotomy of the warmth against her frozen skin, she became aware of how cold she was. Not only could she not move her extremities, but they were so cold that they felt as though they had been lopped off.

"Stop," She attempted to whisper. She went ignored. Or perhaps, it was only in her head that she was actually speaking. No one seemed to hear her.

"Please," She begged pitifully as the intensity of the pain began to increase. She wanted to scream. To cry. To plead. It was too much. She felt movement, pressure. Digging. Pulling. Ripping. Tearing her in two. She felt it. Every. Single. Sensation.

"Help… help me." She pleaded weakly.

But really, who could help her? Wrex was on Tuchanka. John was dead… who would care enough about a disgrace such as her? She was nothing more than a shell of her former self. She was worthless. She was… was… no. She was loved. She was more than just the Huerta incident. She was more than just Commander Shepard's sister. She had a light—a light at the end of the tunnel. She had an angel. An _Arch_ angel.

Her Archangel would never allow this to continue. He would rescue her. There wasn't a doubt in her mind that he would fight to protect her, just as she had done for him so long ago.

She wiggled her finger. Nothing. She gave the gesture another attempt and… success! One of her digits twitched. If she could… just… flex… activate her omni-tool.

A hand slammed down on her palm, an ache blossoming where she had been struck, "What asshole… think to remove… She's smart… idiot… need Aria to come… like a bullet in the head... Whole station… find her."

BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEP.

She wanted to whimper, to curl away from the jagged punishment that had yet to cease… but, her limbs were no longer hers to command. The rocketing of her heart rate only amplified the sensations.

All she needed was to contact Archangel. He would save her. He would shoot these people for harming her, holding her captive, torturing her. Then, he would carry her far, far away. And she would be safe. Safe…. Safe…

"You!" The second voice shouted, annoyed. "Take… it. Make sure… stays alive. No good… us.. dies… still need her."

"Give… another dose." Said the first voice. She felt a pressure on her left arm. Someone was rotating it, pressing something stiff against the soft flesh.

"Idiots… they still want her alive… don't fuck… again."

BEEPBEEPBEEP

Beep!Beep!Beep!...

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Beep!... Beep! … Beep!

Back into the ethereal, she unwillingly went, knowing full well that Archangel would never come. Emma Shepard fell into unconsciousness cold, in excruciating agony, and hopelessly alone.


	12. Chapter 12

_She should have expected all of this to happen._

Lucidity was a treasure that she was barely clinging to. Thanks to the drugs coursing through her veins, she was only vaguely aware of the fact that someone was hoisting her into a standing position. Had it not been for the unforgiving, gloved hand that gripped her lower jaw, her head would have lolled haphazardly onto her shoulder. With the slightest increase in pressure there, her mouth popped open just wide enough to accommodate a thin object that swabbed the inside of her cheek.

"Careful now." This instruction came from a third person in the room, their words garbled with the assistance of a distortion program.

"If we needed a backseat driver, I would have called my mother." The male voice supporting her snapped irritably.

"You say that, and yet, your men nearly failed me during the procedure." The distorted voice drawled. "And should you plan on keeping your tongue, I highly suggest you _watch it_."

 _Truly, what had she been thinking? Why did she ever attempt to delude herself into believing otherwise? Because John was dead? Ha! No, misfortune followed her like an ever-present cloud. Not even the worst calamities could stop the cycle. Always. Always! Just when she had both feet on the ground, someone came along and yanked the rug out from under her._

"My apologies," the male voice responded (with highly questionable sincerity). "How much longer are we expected to put up with this nightmare?"

"Not much. Should everything go according to plan, we can expect to have her off-world within a few hours. No more of this 'hiding-from-Aria' nonsense."

This was answered with a disbelieving grunt, "You say that like it's simple. Lately, anything that should 'go according to plan' has been a death wish."

 _That was life though, wasn't it? Nothing ever went according to plan. She learned that early on. If she had been asked to pinpoint the exact moment that her misfortune began, she could proclaim definitively that it had been the afternoon she and John returned home from school, only to find a completely empty flat and a letter. To say that the ensuing years had been rough was a massive understatement… but, she and John managed. That's just what Shepards did. They found a way to cope using little more than their wit, their humor, and most importantly: their fraternal bond. Shepards were strong. Shepards moved on. Shepards were survivors. It was on Earth that the Shepard siblings began to prove their mettle to the galaxy. John fought. Emma put all his bits back together. It wasn't easy, but they survived. When John began his military career and Emma accepted her scholarship on Elysium, she thought, at long last, their struggle was over. Life was good—they were flourishing in their respective fields and impressing all the right people, just by doing what they always did._

 _Then the Blitz happened._

The distorted voice hummed pleasantly, "Yes, we all know that Archangel has certainly been a thorn in our collective sides the past few months, hasn't he? But, no matter. This isn't our typical product. He should see no need to interfere... Besides, it is not _Archangel_ that we must concern ourselves with right now."

"Done." Claimed the female gripping Emma's face. The one who had been hoisting her up dropped her like a sack of potatoes. She was so drugged, that she couldn't find it within herself to care.

"Had you told me that this was Aria's pet, I would've never agreed. I could've kicked a hornet's nest with less retaliation."

The third voice laughed, the sound was horrific under the effect of the helmet's distortion. "It is amusing for you to believe that you ever had a choice." As suddenly as it had begun, the chuckling stopped. "Cease your whining, it shall all be over soon."

"What do we do while we wait?" Her abductors were starting to leave.

"I am afraid that I have pressing matters, I cannot stay for the time being. In my absence, rally our men and begin preparing for our guest's arrival. I would hate for a repeat of our last visit."

"It will be done. This place is well hidden. Aria should not be a problem again."

"Thank the Ancestors. I just want to forget that I ever took part in this mess." The quieter second voice proclaimed before the door slammed shut, effectively sealing Emma in the darkness with just her miserable thoughts.

 _That was a day that Emma would never be able to forget. The initial detonation of the batarian bombs reminded her of the 4th of July back home. However, the subsequent shrieks of the injured, and cries of the colonists did not. She remembered jumping to her feet and running, mentally mapping where the soldiers on shore leave were. On her way to find John, she also recalled jumping over the dead, dodging the rain of bullets, and hiding from the swooping aircrafts. She ran until she found him. He had been trying to find her, too. She wasn't surprised by that fact. They always worked like that: two polar opposite personalities working in near perfect synchronicity. With very few words, they agreed on what had to be done. John would rally those willing to fight, while sending her his wounded. She would patch and dispatch what she could—all while maintaining the defenses of the school filled with frightened children._

 _When it was over, the Alliance proclaimed that they had succeeded in saving Elysium. But, staring at the aftermath, Emma saw no victory. Despite her best efforts, not everyone could be saved. Disgusted and ashamed, she abandoned the colony. The Alliance was only too eager to move their superstar's sister to the safety of the Citadel, where she would inevitably become the youngest human doctor to intern at Huerta Memorial. John got a Star of Terra and Emma got a butt-ton of therapy (Alliance provided, of course). And, as time went on, she realized: things were going to be okay. Through experiences that would break many, the Shepards proved time and time again that it was only possible for them to triumph and grow. She would never be able to forget the trauma, but it didn't define her._

 _And then, John died._

The lock churned loudly. Emma began twisting in the darkness, aspiring to find a position that didn't send her wound screaming. The fire in her fight had long since died out. Sure, when she first awoke, she raised hell: kicking, screaming, snarling, shouting, thrashing, biting. But, wherever her captors housed her, it appeared they needn't worry about someone overhearing her pleas for help. In fact, when they drugged her after hours of defiance, it seemed to be done more out of irritation rather than worry.

 _It was almost funny how this was the event that finally broke her. She could have conquered the world, so long as she had her brother's shoulder to lean on. Somehow, at the last minute, she managed to scrounge the pieces of her broken self and find refuge on Omega. It was also funny how in the darkest of places, the lowest of her lows—here was where Emma found her light. Her Archangel. Her mysterious turian. Somehow, he was almost as close to her as John had once been, all while ironically being held at arm's length… but, she didn't have to feel guilty because he did the same._

 _And now, she was kidnapped._

Really, now. She should have expected this to happen.

The only silver lining she could hope to find throughout this entire ordeal was that, while the drugs robbed her of her will to oppose her captors, it also deprived of any terror the situation could have inspired. She was being sent off-world. So, what? Staying here on Omega or being shipped off to some god-forsaken land. Did it matter? She had been captured by very competent people. She was abducted by people _so_ competent, they not only managed to hide her away from Aria, but Archangel.

Oh, Archangel. Not for the first time, she pondered how he must have felt when she never contacted him. Was he still looking for her? Or like her, had he given up any hope that she could ever be found? From the conversations between her captors, she didn't need to use her imagination to know what Aria's response to Emma's absence was like. Though she knew Aria's motivations were ultimately selfish, it was almost touching to see Aria going on a rampage in her honor. Morosely, she thought of her friends—of Wrex, of Mordin, of Nalah and Butler—hell, even Boran Cal, Talia and Bev! She wondered how all of their lives would play out now that she would no longer be a factor.

Lastly, she thought of John.

She was back in the hole she had found herself in those first weeks after news of his death broke the headlines. Everything was hopeless. She was as good as dead. Though the dark, ugly, impenetrable hole was familiar, it didn't provide any comfort. Now that she found herself curled back in it, it was unbelievable that she had ever had the strength to pull herself out at one point.

And yet… she had. Hadn't she? She was able to claw her way out of that hole because she had friends that loved her and patients that gave her a sense of purpose. Though it might have been the hardest things she ever did, she still did it! If there was anything that her parents' betrayal, the Skyllian Blitz and the Normandy's destruction taught her over the years, it was that Shepards don't fall. They can stumble, but they dust themselves off and get back up, goddamnit!

And boy, did she have a lot to get her shit together for. The denizens of Omega needed her care. Bray Per'mon and the Gozu District needed her to help Mordin cure the plague. Wrex was going to bring glory to the Urdnot clan. Talia and Bev were expanding their business. Butler and Nalah were going to have a baby. Archangel was going to show her that she could live without John. Not only could she _survive_ , she could start _living_ , and for more than just the sake of someone else—she could take pleasure in doing something as selfish as falling in love.

The only way you were going to keep a Shepard down was if you killed them—but, if there was any truth to her meeting with the drell—then, not even _that_ could hold them back.

And with that, Emma decided why she needed to resist—to keep fighting. When she was little, she and John fought for one another. When she was older, she and John fought alongside one another. After his death, she fought for her sanity. And now that she was laying on the filthy floor, she was going to fight _for_ him. And for herself! And for those that cared for her!

Emma opened her eyes.

The darkness that smothered the room was nearly absolute, save for a sliver of light on the far wall that snaked under what must have been the door. From her earlier bouts of consciousness, she knew that attempting to push herself upright would be fruitless, due to a ziptie binding her wrists. She also knew that too much straining would aggravate the sensitive wound in her abdomen. But, what was a little pain? Everything hurt, regardless of movement, after all.

With a huff, she settled herself onto her back. John had shown her this maneuver. She brought her arms up to her mouth, using her teeth to drag the ziptie so that the locking mechanism rested between her hands. Once that was complete, she extended her arms as far as they could go before slamming them aggressively down, towards her hips. The movement caused the tender flesh near her waist to shriek, which in turn made her lose the momentum needed to snap the binds. She bared her teeth, the flaring pain so intense that it spread dark tendrils throughout her limbs.

Not having any desire to repeat this agony, she came up with a new tactic. She log-rolled so that her face was smushed against what felt like a stack of papers. Her arms cradled her hips in an attempt to keep her bare, torn abdomen from coming in contact with the absolutely disgusting floor. Like this, she slithered both of her knees forward until her barely clad ass was waving high in the air. From here, she brought her fists to rest beneath her chin and pushed until she was situated precariously on all fours. Though each motion brought a fresh torrent of pain, she gritted her teeth and continued to push through.

 _One obstacle down_ , she cheered herself, _you can do this!_

She leaned back until her butt was touching the floor, before bringing her knees to her chest. Reaching around her bare thighs, she felt for her feet and was ecstatic to find that her captors had neglected to remove her shoes. She unlaced the knot of her left shoe and fumbled for a minute, attempting to wedge the thick string between the ziptie and her wrists. Once finished, she unlaced the knot of her right shoe, only to retie the string to the left shoe's lace that had been dangling between her wrists.

Hoping not to take part in a movement that would cause her wounds to scream to high heaven, she was forced to relax backwards gradually, until she was on her back with all four limbs sticking high in the air (not unlike a dead cockroach). With her hands locked awkwardly into position between her knees, she began to pedal her legs. The strings between her wrists rubbed frantically against the ziptie. She started increasing the pace of the motion, rocking her legs back and forth as fast as possible. With just the right mount of friction, she felt the ziptie give way and—POP!

In that moment, she could have sworn that the popping of the bindings was the sound of the angels conversing with her directly. Her limbs fell onto the floor with a mundane flopping noise, but it was a flop of victory—which, was really the best kind of flopping one could hope to accomplish.

All she had to do now was activate her omni-tool, contact Archangel and Aria, and wait for the cavalry to come barging in. She flicked her wrist in the way she had done a million and two times, only to find _nothing_ flared to life. With mild annoyance, she attempted the maneuver again with a more aggressive gesture. No response. She felt along the sensitive inner flesh of her arm only to find a tight band of gauze—right where her omni-tool's port had once been.

"No." She whispered bleakly, "no, no, no, no."

With a few frantic flicks, she attempted to restart the omni-tool, desperately pleading that _some_ part of the hardware remained imbedded. This was not good—very, very, very _not_ good. Without an omni-tool, she was left with no ability to communicate to the outside world. Without being able to request assistance, she was going to have to fight her own way out of here against an unknown number of enemies…. But, without an omni-tool to call a combat drone or an omni-blade into existence, she was screwed. Hell, most damning in her current situation was the fact that no omni-tool meant she didn't even have a goddamn flashlight to see what the fuck she was doing.

Which ultimately meant she was going to have to get creative.

The room was dark. Too dark to search for anything of use. Without knowing just how much damage her captors had inflicted on her, she feared standing up. So, she scuttled forward, with one arm wrapping around her bare stomach while the other helped her crawl towards the door. As she crawled, she made note that the entirety of the floor seemed to be littered with various debris: crumpled planes of plaster, tiny metal screws, rumpled pieces of paper. Though the trek from where she awoke to the door could not have been more than a few feet, the mixture of pain from her injury and the nausea from the drugs left her breathless. Once she finished her _harrowing_ journey, she leaned her head against the door and was surprised to find that it was made of wood, not metal. She touched a hand to the door to confirm this.

Wood. Good god. Where the hell had they taken her that the doors were still made out of wood? She pressed her ear against the door and listened, only to be greatly disappointed. She was met with the sound of movement, just on the other side. Knowing full well that her abductors had locked the door before they took their leave, she dared not rattle the knob, lest it draw the attention of her guard.

With mounting aggravation and increasing fury, Emma felt sweat break out along her back. Frustrated, she tugged at the sweat-soaked strands of hair that bordered her face, the movement causing her elbow to graze her breast. She gasped at the sensation.

Sticking her hand into her bra she found the answer to her problems: the drell's contact card.

With only a single thought driving her forward, Emma did the only thing that made sense and jammed the card into the crevice of the door. She shoved the plastic as deep as it could possibly go before twisting the end she held towards the doorknob. With a practiced flick of her wrist that she hadn't used since John was running gangs back on Earth, she twisted in the opposite direction whilst applying pressure. As she did this, she held tight onto the doorknob and wiggled until she heard the telltale click.

She tried the handle and thanked her lucky stars. She had unlocked it.

As slow as humanly possible, Emma pushed the door open and prayed that the hinges didn't do _the thing_. Once she had sufficiently opened enough space, she dared a peak through the newly made slit.

Her first of glimpse of light revealed that she was being housed in what appeared to be an apartment building. What little paint that had coated the walls was peeling in large swaths onto dirt-encrusted baseboards. The furniture that filled the room was shrouded in a fine layer of dust, insects, and vermin droppings. Even the long, water-stained planks of wood that lined the apartment appeared to be disgusted with the room's state, as they rose and fell in uneven clumps, with certain areas missing the slabs completely. The most important feature was the lone female batarian, who sat on a threadbare sofa with her back to Emma.

A sun insignia tattooed into the back of her head told Emma that she was in the midst of the Blue Suns. So. That was… interesting. It was the Blue Suns that had taken her.

Emma glanced over her shoulder for anything that might be of any assistance and found that the increase in light from this other room now illuminated the one she was being held in. Directly in the path of the illumination, was a large shard of rebar. Emma nabbed it silently and began to push the door even wider.

A loud whining of the hinge nearly had her jumping five feet in the air!

Stifling a horrified gasp, she rolled out of sight, blinking away the tears that had been brought from the movement. Her heart thundered wildly against her ribcage, apparently attempting to hammer a hole out of her chest.

That's it. Game over. She got this far and was going to die because of a fucking door door-hinge! She tightened her grip around the rebar and waited for the fallout.

However, no footsteps came.

She chanced another peak outside and was pleased to find that the guard was still seated with her back to Emma. It appeared that Emma's manipulation had gone unheard. Not understanding how such a miracle could have occurred, Emma found herself squinting at the alien. Headphones. The 600-credit, noise-cancelling type that could have dulled even the eruption of Krakatoa to a soft _boop_. Figures.

Gripping the metal rod, Emma crept out of the door as stealthily as possible and neared the woman.

Step.

 _No movement._

Step.

 _No response_.

Step.

 _No clue._

Step-

Emma was nearing striking distance.

Step.

 _Oblivious._

Stand. Wince. _FUCK, THAT HURT!_

It was this motion that, at long last, riled her guard's attention from the vid she had been playing on her omni-tool. She turned mechanically, reaching for the weapon holstered on her back.

But it was too late.

BAM!

Before the batarian's hand could clasp the handle of the weapon, Emma had violently swung her arm upwards, striking the fragile area where the batarian's skull met her spinal cord. The alien's head slammed forwards, striking the rickety metal coffee table with an audible crash. Emma believed it was this second blow to the alien's head that ultimately caused her to lose consciousness, as her limbs converted to jelly and she sunk to the floor. Emma stood over the alien for a few seconds longer, rebar held high, prepared for another strike should the batarian twitch a single muscle, ignoring the waves of dizziness that threatened to knock her on her ass.

It was only after those few seconds of staring at the batarian's motionless body that Emma began to relax her stance. Despite every instinct warning her to not move someone with a cervical spinal injury, Emma rolled the woman onto her stomach and removed the pistol mag-locked to her back, attempting to keep the movement gentle. She stood up with a mild wince, both from the pain and the guilt.

The sight of an unconscious batarian brought back memories of the Blitz and the advice that John had given her that day. She could remember him gripping her shoulder painfully, forcing her sobbing face to look at him as she blubbered over the alien's life she had taken. He had waved a finger in her face, his voice deadly low: _Quit your crying, Ems. If it's a choice between them or you, you choose you. You look out for number one first._

"I wish Mordin was here to see my backswing." She muttered to herself, attempting to alleviate a clenching in her stomach that had nothing to do with her wound. She slumped histrionically into the lumpy couch that the batarian had previously occupied and raised her hand to the shrieking in her lower abdomen. The source of her woes turned out to be a sloppy line of poorly implemented stitches that wrapped around enflamed skin and oozed saffron-yellow pus. Her nose crinkled with minor disgust as her pinky finger gingerly prodded the warm, tender flesh that surrounded the gash.

Well.

Rolling her head, she took a few breaths while staring at the ceiling to collect her thoughts.

Nothing was making sense. The details of her abduction indicated the blame fell directly at the feet of those responsible for creating the plague… but, being held captive was not the modus operandi of the perpetrators. If the plague creators were onto her, then they would have killed her or held her for ransom. But, she knew what she overheard: they were afraid of Aria and were desperate to keep themselves from getting caught. And that one throwaway line from one of the voices in her room implied that they didn't know about any correlation between herself and Archangel. If these were the plague creators, could it be that they were hoping to start infecting humans? The guard outside her room _was_ batarian, after all.

But, no. No frickin' way. Whoever had been terrorizing the denizens of the Gozu district had been nearly perfect in their execution: the handling of Bray to leave minimal marks, the messages encrypted flawlessly into a very minute fragment of DNA, the near lethality of their bio-engineered bacteria… whoever the culprit was, they were undoubtedly a genius. A complete psychopath, but inarguably a genius. Whoever did the operation… She glanced down at the piss-poor work whose various fluids stained the hem of her underwear. Well to put it mildly, if whoever did her operation had been a military strategist, they would have probably thought invading Russia during the winter was a sound plan.

Goddamnit. Leave it to Omega to make her become the medical version of Gordon Ramsey. Idiot sandwiches all around. But, facts were facts. Whoever did her operation and whoever invented the plague were almost definitely two different people.

A glance at the unconscious woman's sun tattoo confirmed this fact. The plague was crippling the Blue Suns, why would they implement it against themselves?

Emma shook herself. None of that mattered now. She could afford to be insightful _after_ she pulled her sorry hide out of this mess. She made a conscious effort not to step onto the batarian's body as she edged near the abandoned apartment's door, stolen pistol in hand. Hell, if she wasn't in the shabbiest bra she owned and a dirty pair of unicorn underwear, John would have been mighty proud. She peaked out into the equally deplorable hallway and breathed a sigh of relief.

Aside from a criminally hideous orange carpet and spider webs as thick as cotton candy, the hallway was completely empty. Using the peeling hallway walls to maintain an upright position, Emma crept wearily away from the apartment she been stowed away in. Every now and again, she would pass an empty flat whose doors were wide open. Emma cautiously stuck her head into these rooms in order to mentally map out which were empty should she need to hide. To her surprise—all of them were.

Where was everyone? While she wasn't complaining, the fact that she only had one person watching her was suspicious. She recalled one of the voices earlier ordering the other to rally the men and to prepare for their guest's arrival… but, what did that mean? Clearly, whoever the 'guests' were, they were the ones interested in taking her offworld… but, to what end? Was this just a normal (well, normal for Omega) kidnapping? Or, was this something more? How deep did this thing go? So many questions, so little answers.

The stomping of feet up the stair well and the telltale hum of a voice alerted Emma to the presence of someone approaching the landing. Though she was now equipped with the pilfered gun, the lack of stamina and equipment made her reluctant to risk detection unless absolutely necessary. She doubled back, darting into one of the rooms she had just checked.

If she only had one word to describe the room, it would be: vile. Bottles, boxes, drug paraphernalia, garbage, food and insects lined just about piece of useable space and it reeked of stale urine and rotted food. As a bit of added precaution, she ducked behind a rotting kitchen island with a sink full of brackish, clumpy fluid. The foundation of the piece had been slowly devoured by hundreds of scuttling insects that scattered at her very sudden intrusion. As she tucked herself away behind the creeping structure, it felt like millions of imaginary bugs had magically manifested beneath her skin. When she crouched down, her foot stepped on a surprisingly polished knife. She had a half of a mind to slash all the bugs scuttling near her face with it.

Emma could have a patient with his leaking intestines hanging out of his butt, and never so much as bat an eye- but the moment she saw a creepy crawly? That was a one-way ticket to "Nopes-Ville".

Unfortunately for her entomophobia, the instinctual drive for self-preservation predominated any inclination to burst from the room screaming, even when one of the disgusting creatures scampered across her fingers in a burst of speed.

As she kept a careful watch on a particularly large roach that was waving his antennas at her, a man's voice came into clarity. From the pacing of the footfalls and the pauses in conversation, Emma deduced that he must have been speaking through his mic.

"…told Tarak exactly what I told Gurlag: I couldn't give less of a damn what this new guy asks of us so long as they keep their end of the bargain… Yeah, no kidding. That Archangel bastard has botched nearly every job I've taken for the past month. Uh-huh. Mmm. Oh, gimme a sec. I just left, I needed a smoke and Jentha is all prissy about 'secondhand exposure'." With every word, Emma could hear the newcomer's voice approaching. She squeezed her eyes shut and sent a silent prayer to the universe, pleading for this man to have his smoke-break anywhere but there.

Luck, in this instance, was not on her side.

The door swung open and she nearly cried out in frustration.

"Yeah, man, same. But, listen I've got a good feeling about the new guy—the jobs I do finish have been keeping my pockets real full… yeah… no, I know. I'm just saying you ain't gonna hear me complaining. But, if I hear 'jump', you'll be hearing me say 'how high?', you get me?" The guy continued into his mic. Emma heard the flick of a lighter, which was followed quickly by the scent of burning tobacco. She could now hear the whirr of a voice on the other end of the line, but the words were too muddled for her to make much sense of them.

"Listen, don't say that—it ain't getting soft. You ain't on Omega, you don't get it. Every job feels like a trap. Every pickup feels like a ticking time bomb. Every contact feels like a mole. This fucking guy is insane. I don't know what exactly they said, but they got a plot in motion to get rid of him. That's all I care about."

It was in this moment that Emma saw red. _Get rid_ of _her Archangel?_ Not on her watch! Who the hell did they think they were? Her Archangel was out there risking his life to save a countless number of people, meanwhile these assholes only thought about how they could fill their pockets- and they wanted to get rid of _him_? One of the only good things on Omega? Not on her watch. No, Emma wouldn't allow it!

With the Blue Sun's footsteps rapidly approaching her position, her fury-driven mind waited for the perfect opportunity to pounce. Quietly, she slid her foot off the knife that she had stepped on earlier and gripped the weapon tightly in her fist. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement and knew it was time to move.

The startled gasp that the man gave told her that her hiding spot had been perfect. She drove the blade in just above the soft joint of the man's knee. The man, which had been overweight human male, buckled from the blow and she used this as an opportunity to withdraw the gun from the hem of her underwear. With the man slumped over from the initial attack, his bulbous nose was in the perfect line of fire to be struck with by the butt of her gun. BAM! With both nostrils gushing blood from the blow, Emma struck him a second time, which leveled him completely.

Flat on his back, Emma leveled the gun at the man and placed a cautionary foot on his Adam's apple. The adrenaline coursing through her veins was the only reason why she could uphold a vertical position.

From this range, she could hear the voice on the other end of his earpiece _, "Jimbo? Jimbo, are you there? I heard yelling. Report!"_

Emma disengaged the safety while staring directly into his watery grey eyes, "Make an excuse."

"There's—" His T's came out as D's due to the broken nose.

Not willing to trust that he would follow her orders, she momentarily increased the pressure on his larynx, "And make it a good one."

The man's eyes narrowed furiously, but he obeyed, "Another fucking panel fell. I think it just broke my nose

A very turian sounding laugh bubbled from the other end of the line, " _You humans are such pussies."_

"I'll… uh… mic you in a bit." The man beneath her was glaring daggers, but that was fine. He could imagine sticking her all he wanted. In the end, only one of the two people in the room actually had a knife embedded in their vastus lateralis.

"Good man," Emma told him. Though she refused to show it, she felt her vision tunnel as a consequence of her excursions. Needing an excuse to alleviate the vertigo, she bent over and plucked the earpiece from its perch. Standing up, she leaned over the counter and chucked the transmitter into the depths of the sludge in the sink. "And now that you've shown me that you can listen to directions, you're going to help me get out of here by answering my questions."

The man bared his teeth at her, "I'm not telling you shit, you crazy bitch! You stabbed me in the fucking leg!"

"Aww poor baby, let me go get the world's smallest violin." She cocked her head to the side, her tone syrupy sweet before descending into sarcasm, "Try getting kidnapped, drugged, and then cut open like a Christmas ham. After that, we can talk about your owies."

"Bitch." He spat out at her, grinding his molars.

"Now, now, _Jimbo_ —there's no need to call names. We can be civilized, right?"

"What the fuck do you think you can get from me?"

"I already told you. I want to get the hell out of Dodge. But first, you're going to help me. I believe I heard you talking about Archangel. Let's start there."

"Go squat on a cactus, you fucking fuck!"

Emma took a meditative breath. She was going to have to do something that she knew would haunt her for the rest of her days. Just like the Blitz. She didn't want to be this person, but if it meant protecting Archangel and Butler, then she saw no alternative. She knelt down gingerly and began stroking the man's face with the barrel of the gun and put on a simpering voice, "Do you see this gun, Jimbo? Do want to know where I got it?"

The man eyed her suspiciously but said nothing.

Emma pretended to be very interested in the intricacies of the weapon, "I got it after I bashed your friend's brains in. Now, I think we both don't want me to have to repeat that incident, do we?"

The man froze, "You're bullshitting me."

"If I was bullshitting you, then how would you explain why I'm out here?"

"I saw your file. You ain't a merc. You're a civvie, I bet you don't have the balls." He told her, but she detected an unsure trembling in his voice.

Internally, she was pleading for the man to give into the bluff, but nevertheless she reached for the knife embedded in his thigh. She pressed the gun near the abrasion on his forehead, "Are you willing to bank on that?"

"I'll kill you!" He howled before spitting a bloody globule of saliva and mucus at her chest. She eyed the disgusting matter with a perked eyebrow. _So, this is how it's going to be._ She gripped the handle of the knife and gave it a calculated twist, embedding the blade deeper in his hairy flesh.

He hollered loud enough to leave a faint ringing in her ears as he thrashed under her sneaker. She held tight, watching beads of sweat bubble near the wispy halo of his remaining mousey hair.

"Okay! Okay! I believe you! I'm sorry! Please, don't hurt me no more! Please! You can't kill me, I got kids at home!" He pleaded with her desperately. With a placative gesture, he began to twist his arm so that the midnight blue fabric of his shirt rose enough to reveal a sleeve of tattoos. The majority of them had sun imagery, which was expected for his gang, but… closer to his elbow, he had three excellently done, photorealistic images of smiling babies with dates encircling their chubby faces. From those dates, she determined that the youngest was two and the oldest was ten. Ten… The exact age that she and John were when… when…

It was as though she had plunged the knife into her own chest. This wasn't her.

"Tell me what I need to know." She whispered, hoping he didn't hear how the edge had dulled to a plea.

"Alright. Alright. I'm not loyal to the Suns! I'm just here to put food on the table for my kids. Anything you want, I'll tell!"

"What are you planning?" She asked, she paused for a moment and then continued, "Why am I here? What does it have to do with Archangel?"

"I don't know anything," he told her. When she didn't appear to be amused by this information, he backpedaled, "Lady, I swear, I don't know anything. I swear—I swear on my mother's grave, I'm just the security consultant."

"Didn't sound like you 'didn't know anything' before when you were talking to your friend." She gritted, a surge of protective anger threatening to return.

"Listen, all I can tell you is that Archangel is a fucking prick that keeps killing all my men and some new guy came along a few months ago saying they have a plan to take him out if we help 'em. We were scheduled to get the next part of the plan today."

She recognized that the name (or rather, lack thereof) from his earlier conversation, "What did they want help with?"

"Lots of stuff. Slaves. Population info. You, specifically you." He answered. Emma took the gun off of his forehead and he let out an audible sigh of relief.

"Me?" She asked incredulously. After her abduction and brutal treatment at the hands of the Blue Suns, she knew she shouldn't be surprised that someone was out to get her… and yet, here she was, absolutely perplexed by the situation. What would anyone want with her? "What exactly were your orders?"

"I- well, I ain't no merc. I told you—I'm security. I watch cameras all day. My job was to make sure my squad could get you without anyone knowing."

Emma felt herself frowning, "To what end?"

The small change in her facial features seemed to gravely concern the man, as his words seemed to come out an octave higher than normal "I—I don't know! They didn't tell me. I was just following orders. They've requested a lot of services, but you've been at the top of their priorities since day one."

"Why do you keep saying 'they'? I thought you said it was just _one_ new guy?" She asked.

The guy shook his head, "I don't know shit. I never met them in person. I just follow the orders they give… I couldn't even tell you what species they are."

"Why would you follow orders from someone so suspicious?" She asked, disbelieving.

"We're the Blue Suns!" He told her, "So long as there's credits involved, we don't give a flying fuck who you are."

Suddenly, Emma recalled the conversation from the room she had been tossed in, "The new guy was here today, weren't they? They use a voice distortion program, yeah?"

The guy looked apprehensive for a moment, as though afraid to answer her question. However, sprawled out on the floor, gun to his head, foot on his throat with a nose flowing faster than the Nile, he seemed to see Emma as the more immediate threat. "Yes. They were here."

"Do you know who the new guy's 'guests' are? Or rather, why they're afraid of Aria?" Emma pressed.

"They're weird, but they've been to Omega before with some really strange requests."

"Strange?" She repeated.

"Strange," he reaffirmed, "Hand to God, they once asked us to provide twenty-seven humans born under a full moon. As for Aria, she's just a bitch. The last time we had a meeting, everyone ended up dead—including the slaves. That's why the deal is going down here." He confessed.

There was a pause where Emma took the time to mull over the information that he provided, before nodding, "Yeah… That sounds like her. So, you have absolutely no idea why I'm here?"

The beads of sweat were beginning to slide off his forehead, "Lady, all I know is that you got enemies in high places."

Emma knew that the sensible option would have been to tie the man up, scour the room for anything of use and be on her way. But, just like that fateful night that she met Archangel, she knew she was going to do something stupid. _Hell_ , if she was her renegade brother, she would have tied up loose ends, shot the man right then and there and saved herself the moral conundrum entirely. But, the fact of the matter was that she was not John. Even if this guy was a dick that wanted to harm her Archangel, there was more to it. He had kids, three in fact, that depended on him. She sighed. _If it is given to me to save a life, all thanks._

She knew what she had to do.

"I'm going to go grab a length of rope from over there. If you so much a blink too quickly, you'll be eating lead. Do I make myself clear?" She warned.

He jerked his head, "Crystal."

She stood slowly, gun trained on his face. She located a thick length of rope sitting on a pile of dishes nearby. When she returned, she asked, "You smoke here often?"

The guy seemed dumbfounded by the innocent sounding question, "Yeah. It's crawling with vermin, but believe it or not, this is one of the cleanest of all the rooms up here."

"Got any booze in here?" As she asked this, she motioned for him to raise his arms up above his head with a flick of the gun. Using her knees to hold his arms in place (and in the process, probably giving him a real good show), she encircled the rope around his plump wrists while still maintaining a sure grip on the gun. When she made the first knot, she was comfortable in her skills enough to place the gun on the counter and complete the job by securing his wrists to the exposed bit of foundation in the island.

"Uh… yeah. In the cabinet to your left."

"Cool. Bathroom?"

"The hallway on the right, but the crapper ain't working."

Emma scrunched her nose, "You say that like there's a story behind it… but, frankly, I really don't want to know."

With that, she slowly bumbled to her feet and winced as the sutures gave a particularly strong twinge. As she stood, she found herself curling in on the pain. Though the distance to her destination was far from lengthy, the voyage was impeded by massive, waist-high piles of various household belongings that implied that the apartment had once belonged to a human family. Emma picked up a pink, plastic children's backpack with an asari cartoon character from a pile of detritus along the way.

Locating the bathroom had been a simple task—all she had to do was follow the increasing stench of urine and boom! There it was. The concentration of urea was so thick that Emma was forced to hold her breath in order to proceed. On the mildew-stained porcelain sink, she found a half-used bar of soap and a container of dental floss. The space under the sink (the cabinet doors had long since fallen from their hinges), held a pile of wrappers from random toiletries. Hidden amongst the rubbish, she found some useful items: a nearly full bottle of drain cleaner, gloves, a box of tampons, and a pack of sewing needles. All of this, and a slightly stained cotton candy pink dress went into the backpack. She brought this all back to the main living space and returned to the kitchen.

Rifling through the cabinets and piles of unused crap, she found miraculously clean mugs, bottles of water, and salt. After measuring what she approximated to be two cups of water, she popped the glasses into the microwave and continued hunting for items of use. At the man's suggestion, she went through the cabinet containing alcohol and found a massive roll of aluminum foil. She cut off a large sheet of aluminum foil and exchanged its place in her pack for the dress, the pack of needles, dental floss and gloves. After using the alcohol to wash her hands (and even giving her wound an agonizing splash) in lieu of sterile soap, she slipped into the pair of gloves and threaded a needle with the dental floss. By the time she had completed all of this, the water boiling in the microwave was waiting for her. She pulled the cups out and added half a tablespoon of the salt to each.

Swirling the cups of salty water, she placed them gingerly near the man's leg before bringing the remainder of her items. After locating a pair of scissors, Emma sat herself near the wounded appendage.

"What the hell are you doing?" He asked as she began to cut the fabric of his pants away from the knife, exposing the wound.

"Pretending to be a decent human being." She answered, bringing the bottle of vodka to the man's lips, indicating she wanted him to take a swig. He obliged.

"Why the hell would you want to do that?" The man asked incredulously, as though the concept was completely foreign.

"I made a promise to protect life." She answered, wrapping the dress around his large thigh tightly. "As a doctor, it kinda reflects poorly on me if I have a high kill count."

"Bullshit. You told me you killed Eralya. You said that you bashed her brains in." The man accused.

She shrugged her shoulders, "A slight exaggeration on my part. Though it was necessary, it wasn't something I wanted to do."

The man cocked his head, his thick, caterpillar eyebrows furrowing, "I ain't going no where anytime soon. Humor me. What's the real reason? Why are you doing all this for me?"

"I'm not doing it for you," Emma answered honestly, "I'm doing it for those who depend on you. We all do bad things to take care for the ones we love and I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt. Don't make me regret it."

The man eyed her for a few seconds longer and then gave a gravelly chuckle, "I knew you civvies were soft."

"Drink," She ordered, holding the bottle back up to his lips.

Once again, he complied, "Why? I thought it was bad to drink if you're bleeding. Thins the blood or some shit."

"I don't have anything to anesthetize you. You'll understand in a hot second." She answered, lowering the bottle back to her side.

She picked up one of the cups of saline and began to thoroughly douse the knife and the gash with the isotonic solution. Pink water drained down the sides of his leg. Once satisfied, she pressed her gloved fingers above the wound and applied pressure while giving the handle a gentle pull upwards. Unsurprisingly, it came out smoothly, though it caused a slow river of red to trickle from the puckered hole. While she managed to maintain pressure with her left hand, she used her right to irrigate the now open wound with the remainder of the saline solution.

"You know, you seem like the type that would do anything to help your kids." She commented.

The man puffed up proudly, "Damn straight, girlie."

"Then you should also know that it's pretty stupid of you to join a merc group if that's the case." She continued bluntly. When she felt him tensing up, she used her elbow to force his chin up, "Don't look. Just focus on the conversation."

The man made a disgusted noise, "You say that 'cause you ain't ever had to go home and hear your babies cry 'cause they ain't got enough to eat. You don't know what it does to your head to hear that and then find out no one wants to hire you because of some criminal charges."

Emma doused the needle with a good amount of the liquor before placing the point at the edge of his laceration. "You know the Alliance would probably take you. My brother had a rap sheet a mile long by the time he was 18 and they still took him."

The man grimaced as the needle bit through his skin, "Fuck the Alliance. They didn't do shit for me or my little sister after the turians took our parents at Shanxi."

"If you think the Suns are better, than you're an idiot." Emma commented dryly. She noticed his beady eyes traveling towards her hands and she tsked, "Nuh-uh. Up, up. You'll feel worse if you look down."

Following her orders, the man stared intently at her face. Had she not just instructed him to look away from what she was doing, she would have barked at him to cease his creepy antics. But, she focused her attention on her hands instead. And after a while, he smirked. "You know, kid, we ain't so different you and I."

"How do you figure?" She asked absently, her mind focused primarily on ensuring she did her work as efficiently as possible.

"What you said earlier: doing bad things for people we love. I see your angle. You're hot for Archangel."

Emma's blood ran cold, but she did her best to ensure that she didn't provide any indication that he had read her right, "I don't know what you're talking about. My end goal's just to get the fuck out of here."

The man blew a raspberry at her, "Pbbt! Little girl, you're more transparent than a glass of water. You might not believe it, but I got two neurons to rub together. You don't think I don't know you could have hidden away here without me knowing? You didn't attack me because you was worried about yourself, it was 'cause I talked about that bastard Archangel."

Emma knew she had to lie. She glanced up, making sure to make eye contact, "Archangel's… special. He protects people like me, so I owe him a lot. If I know someone's trying to hurt him, I can use that information to get my ledger back in the black."

The man continued to try and read her, attempting to call her bluff. She was a good liar when she put her mind to it, and he seemed to accept her explanation. With a shrug, he answered, "I can respect that."

Emma finished stitching the wound with a satisfying knot, "All done."

"Mind doing me one more favor?" He asked.

"Depends." She answered, eyebrow raised curiously.

"You interrupted my cigarette break. If I'm gonna be here a while, you mind lighting me another?" Emma couldn't help a laugh from sputtering out. She nodded, and the guy seemed content, "Awesome. My pack and lighter is in my breast pocket".

Emma leaned over and dipped her hand into the aforementioned pocket to pull out the requested items. After lighting the cigarette and holding it up to his mouth, she rattled the Bic in his face, "You mind if I keep this?"

The man took an appreciative puff and managed to speak around the cigarette, "Be my guest."

With all that said and done, she took to her feet and began completing her final preparations. She perused the cabinets one last time and was ecstatic to find a massive plastic bottle of olive oil. She opened the cap and mixed a healthy portion of it with the remaining alcohol. Using the knife, she had removed from the man's leg, she chopped up the bar of soap she found in the bathroom into miniscule chunks. It was at this point that the man seemed to understand her end goal.

"You know, you really are a crazy little bitch."

As she continued chopping the soap, she answered, "Be grateful. It's only because of my brand of crazy that I didn't just leave you to bleed out like a stuck animal."

"I could have called for help." The man answered defensively, his acerbic nature curbed slightly by the consumption of nicotine.

Emma blew a raspberry, "Puh-lease. If there was anyone up here to hear you scream, I would have been dead by now. You scream louder than a 13-year old girl at a boy band concert…. Alright. Done." She scooped the nail-sized chunks of soap into the glass bottle containing the alcohol/oil mixture and plugged the entire contraption up with the unused tampon. "Still enjoying your cancer stick?"

"The best."

"Well, I'm about to blow shindig." She stared at the unlit Molotov cocktail and shrugged, "Wish I could say it's been a pleasure… But, in all honesty, you're kind of a dick." She held two fingers up to her forehead and gave him a sarcastic salute as a sendoff. Before she could collect her belongings to leave, he called her over.

"Oi! Don't leave yet." He called.

"Hmm? Did you drop your cig or something?" She asked, pivoting on her heel.

"No. Listen, I need you to reach into my pants."

"Not a chance in hell," She answered automatically.

"I'm not talking about my dick. Just get over here. My access pass to get into the cam room is in my front pocket. Take it. It won't get you out of here, but it'll help. Two floors down, room 7233" He jerked his chin towards his left-hand side. Intrigued by the offer, she returned to him and reached into his pants. Just as promised, she found a thick plastic keycard waiting for her. "Don't get on the elevator. You get on the elevator and you'll be on the cams. If my facial recognition software picks up your mug, the whole goddamn place goes on lockdown. Barred windows, locked doors, sirens, the whole nine yards. You don't want that. _Comprendo_?"

" _Comprendes_ ," Emma corrected him, knowing full well that he would take her response as an affirmation rather than an insult.

"Alright. Now that we got that shit squared away, we're even, yeah? We kidnapped you, you stabbed me. You stitched me up, you get a keycard. Now we're both in the black." He told her. If this buffoon thought they were even, then he was delusional. But, what did it matter really? She nodded, but only once. "Good. Now get out of here and let me enjoy my cigarette."

She did just that. While the man might not have handed her a one-way ticket out of the building, he did provide her with some tasty tidbits. As she made her way into the stairwell, she shuffled the pack higher up her shoulder. While there might not have been any cameras here, she cursed the man and his stupid facial recognition software with each agonizing step that she took.

Once on the landing, Emma did yet another visual survey of her surroundings and immediately noticed the camera posted in the hallway. If she hung ridiculously close to the wall, it would be easy to play with its blind spots, but there was another obstacle: two LOKI mechs. They were guarding what she could only assume to be the cam room.

While she wasn't exactly thankful for their presence, she realized that things could have been monumentally worse. LOKI's were incredibly predictable in their programming. Even someone as inept as Emma in robotics would be able to work around their very limited features. Emma didn't withdraw her weapon. She knew that should she dare fire a single shot, not only would she risk missing and giving away her location to anyone remaining on the floor, but she would also activate their combat mode, which would send an alert signal to nearby friendly forces. But, LOKIs were dumber than a fried popsicle—if she managed to dismantle them without triggering their combat mode, she could dispose of them easily.

She shrugged off the backpack and rifled through it until she found her bottle of water. She rapidly gulped down the remaining liquid until there was only a thin layer left. She then retrieved the bottle of drain cleaner and sheet of aluminum foil. She tore the metallic sheet into tiny, balled clumps and dropped them into the water bottle. Once all the foil had been used up, she poured a decent amount of drain cleaner into the solution and capped the bottle tightly. Careful not to agitate the materials too much, she aimed the bottle and thanked her lucky stars that she had been the president of the Chemistry Club in high school.

The plastic bottle arced high in the air, flying well passed the two mechs, who followed its trajectory with immense interest. When it contacted the floor, it began to roll playfully away. The mechs, childish by their nature, chased after the bottle like pups after a ball. When their backs were fully turned, Emma hastily grabbed her belongings and exited the stairwell, careful to remain within the blind spots of the security camera. As she retrieved the man's access pass, she glanced over to see that the clear bottle was beginning to fill with a thick, whitish gas. Just as the doors slid open to allow her entry, one of the mechs had lifted the rapidly ballooning bottle in victory.

Unfortunately for Emma, the doors slid shut before she could watch the blast of the chemical bomb destroy the mechs. Knowing that it was only a matter of time before someone came to investigate, she quickly went to work on the wall of computers to her left. The entire facility was available for her viewing pleasure. On her floor were a handful of Suns going about their various businesses: a few were perusing the halls, some were playing cards, one of the more humorous vids caught a man zooming across his office in a wheeled chair, only to have a wheel catch on a cord on the ground and forcefully eject the man three meters. As she scrolled around the floor, she figured that once she disabled the security matrix, she would have to cut two hard lefts to get to the elevator. From there however… well, that was problematic.

According to the feeds, the majority of activity was on the lower floors, where a countless number of Suns milled about, seemingly in wait. So, even if she did manage to shut down the camera feeds and take the elevator down to the lower levels, it would be into the viper's nest. Whatever. It was something that she was going to have to worry about later. Maybe she would be able to find a fire escape once she hit a certain point. What mattered now was the cameras.

She brought up the file explorer on the computer and punched in "C-A" into the search bar provided. Results popped up immediately, but rather than an app appearing, an email did.

Emma clicked on the unopened email and murmured the titled aloud, "Can't wait."

 _ **Can't wait**_

 _Tarak:_

 _I've been contacted by the man you messaged me about. Provided you give me your word that they are trustworthy, I will throw my hand into the pot as well. I never thought I would ever extend an olive branch to a sworn enemy, but this Archangel issue has transcended petty rivalries. For this and this only, I am willing to put aside our differences. Attached are our files on the matter, I expect the same in return._

 _I look forward to seeing what the future has in store for us._

 _Jaroth_

The "attached file" was 4,568 KB—meaning that there wasn't a shot in hell that she was going to be able to read all that information… but, it seemed integral to protecting Archangel. She glanced around, hoping to find anything that might help her and immediately caught sight of a datapad that was just practically begging for her to steal it. She connected the tablet to the computer, switching back to the security feed as she waited for the files to transfer. What she saw there… well, to put it mildly: she was up shit's creek, and the proverbial paddle just transformed into a butt plug.

Converging on her location were several mercs, the closest of which was a three-man unit headed by a human female. There wasn't anytime left to quietly disengage the security program—the woman was now inspecting the disassembled LOKIs and pointing fingers at Emma's door. Emma grabbed the tablet as soon as the transfer was complete and backpedaled until she was hidden behind a particularly large desk. By the time the doors slid open, Emma had already lit the tampon string ablaze.

The first to enter was the human female with tan skin and a greasy, red bowl-cut. She swept the room efficiently, gun-drawn and floundered momentarily when she realized that there was no one in the room. She made a gesture with her hand and was immediately joined by a turian and a batarian in matching blue and white armor. They immediately went to the consoles, and when they did, Emma was ready.

Before they could make heads or tails, Emma lobbed the Molotov cocktail and watched it explode upon impact with the computer systems and squad. The blast startled the batarian, who leapt, rolling into a spray of napalm and setting himself ablaze. The female had taken some of the flaming liquid to her face and was shrieking in pain.

Emma made a break for it, only barely remembering to grab the gun and tablet in the process.

"Get her!" The human howled with an animalistic edge, slapping at the flames frantically.

RA-TA—TA—TA—TA!

The blasts from the rifle left her ears ringing. Emma's arm was wrenched forward by what felt like a molten hot sledgehammer as she scrambled from the room. A numb tingle shimmied up her arm as liquid heat glided profusely down the appendage. Frightened beyond all belief, Emma began zigzagging her way down the hallway. She heard the turian close on her tail, but she was unwilling to stop and draw her weapon. More bullets whizzed passed her and she noticed that the pursuant was now joined by the batarian. Thankfully for her, it appeared that they realized who she was and were attempting to land more difficult, nonfatal blows. Emma ran until her lungs felt like they were on fire, a trail of red drops following in her wake.

She turned a corner, slipping slightly on her own blood.

Waiting for her there was a single turian, aiming an assault rifle directly at her chest.

Knowing that at least two of the three Suns from the cam room were behind her, Emma saw no other choice.

Emma charged the turian, who adjusted his grip on the weapon.

At the last second, she dove.

Using the blood on the soles of her shoes as lubrication, she slid cleanly like a baseball player between the turian's legs.

Once behind the turian, Emma felt several stiches burst and spew blood.

Before the turian could blink, she was back on her feet and already running down the next hallway.

It was funny, she could almost swear that she heard him call her name.

As she sped down another turn, she heard the gunfire continue, yet it was growing fainter. Perhaps she had lost them?

She withdrew her pistol from the waistband of her underwear and slammed her uninjured shoulder into the door of one of the rooms. Following the technique of the merc that had barged into the cam room, she swept the room and was elated to see it completely empty.

She flung the door shut and flicked the lights shut. She found refuge in a private corner, dropping low to the floor less any more bullets come her way.

She was trembling like a leaf. She couldn't believe she had made it through that alive. Clasping a hand over her mouth to disguise a nervous laugh, she inspected her injuries. A couple of the stitches had popped in a massive burst of off-white pus and dark blood. Traveling up her blood-smeared body, she saw her most grievous wound and was unfathomably relieved to find that her bullet wound was just a graze. She rocked her head back against a pile of boxes and listened to the rattling of gun fire.

Deep (quiet) breath in.

Deep (quiet) breath out.

Deep (quiet) breath in.

Deep (quiet)-

"JENTHA! Jentha, report! Why am I receiving alerts that there is a _fire_ in _my_ facility?" A distorted voice shouted from the corner of the room.

Emma's heart stuttered, stopped completely, and then revived itself, only to go into overtime.

In the corner of the room was a communication terminal, alight with the masked face of a humanoid. Emma crawled towards the terminal, hoping to shut it off before the noise alerted the mercs to her location.

But then, Emma froze. The voice. It was _the_ distorted voice.

Her blood boiled.

The masked face turned towards Emma, "Jentha, you answer this instant… _. Oh_ , it's _you."_

Emma's lip curled into a snarl, "Hate to be the bearer of bad news."

The masked person shook their head, "I should have expected something like this. Just like the rest of the vermin that infests that place, you have managed to wriggle and worm yourself free. But you know what? I am happy we are getting this chance to talk. Lately, your look has just been so…. _Pitiful_."

Emma cut her hand through the air, "Enough theatrics. Who are you?"

"Hmm," They answered smoothly, "You know, I am just so disappointed in you, Emma, dearest. Here I am, knowing so much about you and you do not even have the courtesy to remember me? Tut-tut. You must be losing your touch."

"Cut the shit. What do you want from me?" Emma growled, unimpressed.

"What do I want from you?" the figure pretended to tap their chin, "Well, what I want more than anything is to see you dead. I would love for nothing more than to see that pretty little head of yours on a pike, while your corpse rots alongside your good-for-nothing brother. Unfortunately for me, however, my clients' desire for control is interfering with that."

Emma recalled her dream and then it clicked, "You!" Emma shouted. "You… bastard! You're the one that's been sending me the letters, aren't you? AREN'T YOU?"

At her outburst, the figure laughed, "Even the lowliest of pests are capable of displaying intelligence, it seems. Oh, _doctor_ , did they not teach you in all those years of schooling that rabid animals need to be put down?"

"Eat a dick. You give me brother back, right now!" She snarled. Her knuckles had faded to a bloodless white from how tightly she gripped the counter. When the figure answered only with a smug laugh, Emma lost control, "Listen here, you motherfucker! I'm about to get out of here, and when I do, you better watch the fuck out because I am going to find you. I'm going to find you and I'm going to gut you—gut you like a goddamn animal and not feel a fucking thing after what you've done to John. Am I making myself clear?"

The figure hadn't stopped laughing, "Like a child throwing a tantrum!"

" _I'll show you a fucking tantrum, you coward!"_ Emma bellowed, "You want to kill me? I'm right here! Come and get me!"

The laughing stopped gradually, "Oh, that is not necessary. We already _have_ you, you see? You might have escaped your cage, but we still have you by the tail. We have the _flawless, undefeatable_ Commander Shepard under our heel and you think _yourself_ so special? No, you are just like all the rest that have fallen under the delusion—the lies fed to the galaxy about the cult of Shepard."

"What the hell are you—" Emma was interrupted.

"You know what I had always hated about you two? You, in particular though? You always pretended to be so virtuous, so untouchable. But you are no better than anyone else. You have never fooled me. You deem me the monster? Take a good look in the mirror."

Emma was beyond furious, "I don't know what you're talking about. But, I know you're fucking delusional."

The figure sighed, "Such a foul mouth, but that is fine. Eventually, you will submit. We all will. It is an inevitability. Anyone that attempts to stop it will be disposed of… is that not correct, _John?"_

The angle swung, the camera having been picked up. Emma could now see that the figure had been sitting within a sterile white room. The image was pixelated at first, but when it came into clarity, Emma had to keep herself from whimpering.

Emma was looking at her brother.

He wasn't in the room with the mysterious figure, but rather, was on a monitor within the room that they were in. Lying naked on a metallic operating table without so much as a simple sheet to keep his body warm, John was stuffed full of various pipes and wires. The thin skin that barely managed to stretch across his gaunt face was so thin, that she could easily distinguish several facial blood vessels, despite the horrendous quality of the image. While it was clear that he was still very much dead, it was evident that extensive work had been done on his body.

"I'm going to kill you." Emma vowed, "I don't care who you are or why you're doing this. I'm going to find you. I _swear_ it."

"Ahh, doctor, though it has been an absolute pleasure, I am afraid I must cut this short." the image swung round to face the helmeted figure, but the glowing eyes of their helmet didn't seem to focus on Emma as they had before, "Jentha, please take care of her. And, do remember: maim, don't kill. She is still vital, afterall."

"What?" Emma turned and was met with the human female from earlier. Her face had been destroyed by the Molotov cocktail: the flesh from her jaw, cheek and forehead was peeled in fleshy, bloody strips and was even blackened in some areas from the fire. With what little skin that she had left remaining on her face, she snarled ferally at Emma and pulled the trigger.

Three bullets whizzed by Emma's head and punched holes into the foundation behind her, eliciting from her a high-pitched shriek that had dogs within a three-kilometer radius cringing. Emma hit the floor, grabbing the pistol and rolling out of the line of fire.

"Boys! On my position. Get in here before I kill this bitch for what she did to my face!" Jentha howled from the doorway.

Emma popped from cover and aimed a quick shot at Jentha, but her high-tech armor absorbed the impact.

One!-two!-three!-four!

Four more bullets punctured the soft flesh of the sofa Emma was taking refuge behind. Emma yelped and scuttled backwards on her elbows and knees, desperate to avoid the fate of the furniture. At one point, Emma slipped in a puddle of her own blood tumbled onto her butt. There was the heavy thunk of approaching booted feet, and soon, the woman known as Jentha was upon her, weapon drawn. Up close, Emma could see more details of the burn she had inflicted with the Molotov cocktail. The skin was open, blistering, and bloody, with thick gobbets hanging loosely from the side of her jaw.

"You're coming with me, you little cunt!" She snarled. Emma squeezed off a few more rounds, but the blue blur of Jentha's shields absorbed every single bullet. Jentha kicked Emma's hand and sent the gun hurdling across the room. The next kick went directly into Emma's ribs and a scream ripped through the air. When Emma was able to look up, she saw Jentha aiming her pistol.

Bullets tearing from the hallway startled both of the women.

Men's shouts of pain were issued and, just as quickly, silenced.

Then, Jentha's head exploded

Emma's throat went raw from the shriek that ripped through her as the woman's body collapsed atop her own. The wallop from the impact that occurred when the woman's armored body landed atop Emma's bare one left her breathless. She was quickly smothered under a fine layer of bone, blood and brain as she attempted to wriggle her way out from beneath the dead merc.

Then, the killer swung around the side of the furniture. Emma recognized him, it was the turian merc whose legs she had slid between from earlier. All she could focus on was the very imposing sniper rifle he held in his hands. Emma managed to worm her way out from under Jentha and was struggling to move herself backwards, away from the terrifying man. She held her hands up, a submissive whimper rolling out.

"Spirits, Emma." The turian rumbled. She started, recognizing his voice.

There was a pressure between her legs as he moved to kneel between her quivering knees.

When she felt Archangel press his forehead against her own, she took a shuddering breath, and knew that everything was going to be alright.


	13. Chapter 13

**Author's Notes: DARN YOU FF ! Why do you keep changing my story to code? Sorry to anyone that read that nonsense!**

 **I also come bearing some bad news with this chapter. Archangel will be going on a brief hiatus. This isn't out of disinterest, but because I need to plan how the rest of the story will go from here. I promise I will return as soon as possible! So, thank you for all the love, the subscribes, the reviews, and for reading. This story wouldn't exist without your support! So THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU.**

 **And, [here comes shameless self-plug] if you are waiting in the meantime, I started a new story for anyone interested in less feels and more smut! (Though, expect smut in the upcoming future for Archangel)**

* * *

She nearly cried out from the loss when she felt his helmet's pressure lift from her forehead.

The threat of the Blue Suns remained, and he was preparing to venture onward. However, she was unwilling to blink, let alone move, lest he disappear before her very eyes. It would only seem fitting that he would though, no? His rescue was simply too improbable to be true—surely, his presence before her was a cruel trick of the blood loss, or a side effect of the drugs that still coursed through her body. She found herself crawling towards him upon her hands and knees, giving him pause only after she had reached out.

Her fingertips brushed against the frigid metal of his helmet.

Her palm settled flat against him.

Solid. Real.

A gauntleted hand came to cover her own, pressing it tighter against the helmet.

"Oh!" she cried out, surging forward in a fit of elation. Before she knew it, both of her arms were clasped around his carapace, pulling his much larger body flush against her own battered form. "You're here. You're really here."

For a terrifying moment, she feared she had overstepped a boundary, as he stiffened in her embrace. Embarrassed and blushing, she attempted to pull away, but was stopped when his hand tentatively her waist closer. She stilled. His other hand wound its way through her hair, urging her to return to her original position. Sweet relief coursed through her. He was real. He was real, and he was there for _her._

"Emma" He murmured into her hair, "You're shaking."

"I'm sorry," she answered breathlessly, tightening her grip around him, "I—I can't stop it. I'm sorry."

"I know it's hard, but I need you to breathe for me," He was beginning to extricate himself from her grip. "I'm here now and it's going to be okay."

"I didn't think l was ever going to see you again," She confessed, her bright eyes wishing she could assess his reaction. Without his body, she leaned against a nearby bit of wall support. She winced from the motion and automatically curled her hand against the warmth that continued to seep from her abdomen. When she pulled her palm away, she saw that it came away with fresh blood. The two of them stared at it until she had the mind to wipe her sticky hand on the carpet.

"Spirits," he cursed again, "What did they do to you?"

He was kneeling before her again, smothering her wound with a packet of medigel.

The irony of the moment was not lost upon her.

His question, however, brought to life memories of when she first awoke following her abduction. She recalled the terrifying sensation of tiny little stabs gliding across her belly as they violated her body. In vivid detail, she could remember the feeling of the warmth of her blood spilling across her ice-cold skin. She relived the yanking, the ripping, the tearing. She recalled the loneliness and the helplessness as she eventually realized that no one was coming to her rescue.

She began to hyperventilate and knew her heart was racing just as fast now as it did back then.

"Bad things," Was all she could manage.

This gave Archangel pause. He wiped the lingering medical goo on the carpet before taking her chin between his long thumb and forefinger. "I swear, anyone who's touched you is as good as dead."

"Please," She pleaded, "I just want to go home."

He got to his feet, retrieving the Mantis he had dropped near Jentha's corpse. Emma's eyes lingered on the Blue Suns logo for a single second before she gasped. His head swung around to face her.

"Archangel!" She exclaimed, "You can't be here! They want to kill you!"

He snorted confidently, dislodging the spent heat sink casing, "Good. More target practice for me."

"No!" She insisted defensively with a shake of her head. She used the wall to push herself onto her feet, but the beating she took earlier left her reeling. She stumbled. Archangel was immediately there, catching her. She balled her hands into fists against his chest, "I'm not saying it right. They're planning… Well, I don't know what they're planning, but you're in danger."

"I think you're confused about who needs protecting here." He teased.

She pointed to the tablet, "I'm not going to let you die because you won't take me seriously. One of the only things that let me push through all this was the thought that I would be able to see you again."

"Relax. I'm not planning on dying anytime soon." He told her. "We still haven't done the first date thing we talked about."

He still didn't understand. She went in for the kill, "The Suns kidnapped me ultimately to get to you."

Beneath her fingers, Archangel stiffened. There was a fear in his voice she did not expect, "What did you say?"

"It wasn't because they knew about us, but there's a connection."

"How can you be so sure?" he asked.

"I don't—" She paused as the clamoring of footsteps rang out down the hall, "We don't have the time to discuss it. Just trust me, please."

She wasn't sure if it was the urgency of the situation or the urgency in her voice that finally made Archangel recognize the worth of her worries, but he gave a single nod and stowed away the datapad she had stolen. He released his gun from maglock and inched near the doorway. She followed close behind, careful not to make herself too visible and watched him watch the wall. It was… slightly unnerving.

It wasn't until he was whipping around the doorway and into the corridor that she realized he must have had a visor with a biofeedback sensor and was not, in fact, simply staring at a wall like a big dummy.

She realized then that it was her first time ever witnessing him in action and his precision was… very curiously enticing. She had never been the type to condone violence (especially given her profession), but the efficiency with which he shot and killed the string of Suns that rounded the corner was breathtaking. Archangel had never elaborated on how he knew John, but in that moment, she wished John was alive to see how skilled her Archangel was. She would bet every credit in her (admittedly, barren) bank account that even her fastidious brother would be impressed.

His back was to her. Her musings had been interrupted when she noticed the blue flicker of his shields flare to life on his right shoulder—someone had been shooting him from behind.

It took no thought from Emma's end. Before she could even interpret just what her actions meant, she was stepping out into the hall and reaching for Archangel's unused assault rifle, releasing it from the maglock. She spun on her heel, the M-96 Mattock nestled comfortably against her uninjured shoulder and pulled the trigger. The two Suns there had been startled by her presence. Their hesitation was all she needed to neutralize the threat.

She felt Archangel's gaze on her back. She pivoted, holding his gun out to him.

"What?"

He made a small whirling gesture in her direction, "Do you think that at some point in this rescue mission, you'll let me do some of the rescuing?"

She smiled sheepishly, "Did I steal your thunder?"

He ushered her down the hall and made grand, overly-dramatic gestures as he spoke, "As the ever-benevolent vigilante that I am, I of course do everything in my power to find my girlfriend after she gets kidnapped by a devious villain. As soon as I make a break in the case and find out where she's being held, not only do I find that she's managed to escape her captors and give them Hell but has gone out of her way to protect me in the process. You're wounding my very fragile ego."

"I am so very sorry to be the cause of such anguish." She ribbed back. It was absurd that despite the pain and despite her situation, she was smiling. Archangel was about to turn right when she touched his elbow and pointed to the left, "Elevators are that way."

He shook his head, "Not a good idea. My tech expert told me the elevators are rigged with a facial recognition system. If we go in, this place goes on lockdown and we'll be trapped."

"Already took care of it." She stated.

"You already took care of it?" He asked incredulously.

"Unless computer hardware can survive napalm, then yes, I took care of it." She answered.

"I'm beginning to feel like you're just trying to steal my job, Doctor Shepard" He told her, but she could discern a hint of pride beneath the teasing, "So… I never would have pegged you as the shooting type."

"I'm not," she admitted, "but I _am_ Commander Shepard's sister, where do you think he got it from?"

This appeared to give Archangel pause, "No way."

"Of course, I'm what got him through PT."

"You can't be serious." He responded, though he sounded unsure.

"Not even a little bit," She laughed, "But, I had you going for a second there, didn't I?"

"That you did." He gave her cheek a lighthearted pinch and she giggled. "Though I should have known better. Your form, well, I hate to say it because it's you, but _damn_. Absolutely atrocious."

She faked her offense, "And what's that supposed to mean?"

He halted momentarily and glanced down at her, the back of his talon tracing down a dirt-smeared cheek, "Just that I'll have to show you how to handle my rifle properly."

He continued onward, chuckling at how his words had brought a rosy hue to her cheeks.

When she shook sense back into her head, she had to jog just to match pace. Smug bastard. She waved a finger at him, "You're good. You're really good."

"Shit." He stopped short and she stupidly collided into his back. He was staring at the wall again, "They know we're here- we got company and a lot of it. Stay hidden and no heroics on my behalf this time."

He tucked her behind a stacked pile of cardboard boxes and left to creep along a length of wall. She watched him, prowling like she used to see big cats do right before they pounced on unsuspecting prey. When the first Sun whipped around the corner, Archangel was waiting to deliver a blow with the butt of his gun. Gripping the merc's shoulder, Archangel slammed him powerfully against the wall with one arm, the other pulling the trigger of the rifle aimed at his gut. When three more came hustling in, all it took was a simple kick to knock the first into the second two and three bullets to finish the job.

She was close enough to hear his helmet buzz with a static filled voice.

"Archangel, this is Butler, the block's real hot. What's goin' on down there?"

Without so much as momentary break in his momentum, Archangel took care of at least five more Suns as he answered, "Asset acquired. I'm going to need an evac from the roof. Now."

"How's our Ems?"

"We're not in a position to chat." Archangel snapped. "Just get me that damn shuttle, elevator access."

He hauled ass to where she was hiding, his knees bending slightly as he beckoned her with his talons.

"But what abou—"

"Don't make me say it twice." Archangel snapped. He snapped off his headset, "Come. We're running out of time."

She took his hand and allowed him to lead the charge to the elevator, the adrenaline giving her just enough edge to sprint after him. Occasionally, he would turn a corner, only to push her away and lead her back to where they just had come from. She couldn't figure out how he knew which hallways were dangerous, but each time he did, he would wrap himself around her and bring her back to safety.

Eventually, the elevator came into view at the end of a narrow hallway. As they turned the corner, he pushed her in front of him and covered the exit, a handful of footfalls behind. She ran as fast as she could but yelped when a few bullets whizzed past her. Looks like they weren't worried about taking her alive anymore. When she got to the elevator, she punched the button, ramming her knuckle repeatedly into the plastic.

"C'mon. C'mon." She whispered.

A bullet punched through the metal near the elevator's frame and she immediately hit the floor with her hands covering her head (for all the good that would do). She checked over shoulder, watching him effortlessly plow through merc after merc as though they were little more than weeds. The VI chimed, informing the level that the elevator had arrived. Freedom! Just around behind those metal doors.

"Archangel!" She hollered. The sound of her voice drew the attention of a Sun. She saw the barrel of the gun raise but was too slow. "FUCK!"

"Emma!" Archangel was sprinting for her.

It felt like eternity had passed before the cool metallic doors of the elevator slid open. Archangel nabbed her off the floor with an arm around her waist and all but flung her inside the elevator. She landed in the corner of the lift and watched him come in behind her, stopping only to punch the commands into the elevator.

Footsteps.

The doors weren't closing fast enough.

"Shit!"

Archangel was crowding her now, towering menacingly over her with a hand planted on either side of her head.

More footsteps. Heat sinks discharging.

"Eyes on me, Emma." He told her.

She followed his commands, staring directly into the visor. At this range.. she swore… oh, it might have been a trick of the light… but…

The elevator was assaulted with the blasts from bullets as they tore through the narrow opening of the closing doors. She could hear them slice through the metal like it was wet paper. Archangel grunted, and she disobeyed his order long enough to see the blue of his shields flare up, absorbing the impact of what seemed like _a lot_ of bullets.

She gasped in horror.

"Don't look." He told her, "Key looking at me, honey. My shields can handle it."

She felt like she was choking.

It felt like a miracle when the doors finally slid shut and the elevator began to ascend.

The two of them were panting, their chests gently bumping at the apex of each breath.

"Archangel!" She gripped the anterior carapace.

"I'm fine. Not a scratch on me." He told her calmly, but then his voice deepened, "Talk to me, what happened?"

She glanced down, and his attention followed hers.

Surrounding her shoe was a puddle of dark red blood that originated from a massive hole. She giggled nervously, her voice sounded hysterical as she said, "Shot through the foot. The foot. I've been shot through the foot."

His hands were on her face, urging her to look upwards, "Emma, stay with me."

She was sinking against him, her limbs turning to jelly. It was only due to the arms supporting her that she was capable of standing upright.

"Stay with me. Don't look down, just keep looking at me. C'mon, you're doing so good. Just stay with me."

She was rubbing her bloody hand over her face, the hysteric laughter fading only slightly. "Shot through the foot! The foot! I think it's a metaphor for something!"

She was slumping further against him, her vision starting to darken around the edges.

He was shaking her. Begging for her to stay awake. She felt nauseas.

His face was so close. She stared intently into the glass portion of the helmet. Her hand languidly touched the surface.

"I can… see your eyes through your helmet…." She whispered against him. "Blue…. Your eyes are so blue."

And then, all she saw was black.

Beep! … Beep! … Beep! … Beep! …

 _Oh no._ Emma thought with desperation. She knew that sound. _Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no!_

There was a cool pressure on her forehead. She wanted to jerk away, but once again, every muscle in her body felt like it had been pumped full of concrete. She didn't want them touching her, she knew what would happen if she permitted this to continued. Ripping, stabbing, tearing.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

"What's going on?" a familiar voice asked.

Every bad thought left her in that instant.

"Heart rate accelerating. Likely due to stress." She also knew this voice.

"Is she in pain?"

"Highly unlikely. Probably disoriented from anesthetic. Confused. Loss of over 30% of blood volume increases symptoms."

"What can we do for her?"

"Done all I can. Though if must know, physical touch incredibly important to human psyche. Skin to skin contact recommended after kidnapping. Closure, security—valuable to maintaining positive outlook."

She noted that the pressure on her head immediately disappeared. There was a loud hissing, followed by a metallic clink. The pressure returned, this time squeezing her hand, the texture vastly different. Whereas before it had been cold and smooth, now it was soft and leather-like.

"She's tensing up. There has to be something more that we can do for her."

"Please. She is my patient. My priority. More than that, Shepard is good friend. Good doctor. All can do now is wait…. Ah, eyes seem to be opening. Consciousness returning faster than expected."

"Mrdn?" She heard herself mumbling. Her eyelids quivered, and a foggy image came into view.

"Hello, Doctor Shepard." Mordin sang happily. She could see the obscure shape of him approaching her. Now that she kept her eyes trained on one spot for quite some time, she could see that she was laying down on a large bed with warm, fuzzy sheets covering her legs. Mordin came to stand to her right.

"WhereamI?" She slurred.

"My apartment. Specifically, bedroom. Your… friends brought you to me during evening tea." He answered. He seemed to scan her with his omni-tool. When he finished, he _hmpf-ed_ and added, "How are you feeling?"

"LikeItooksomeseriousdrugs." She answered.

"Opioid anesthetics. So. Yes. Definitely serious drugs."

"Friends?" She asked.

The pressure around her hand squeezed slightly tighter, "It's good to see you awake, Emma."

Sluggishly her head lolled to the left and she was greeted with the double image of a very familiar outline of armor. She looked down at her hand and saw a three-fingered hand wrapped over her own. Her heart warmed. She put every ounce of energy into giving the hand a squeeze of her own back. Though it was slow to form, she gave him a smile.

"Ah. Turian mating pheromones detected."

"Thank you, Mordin." Her turian responded, his head never lifting to face the salarian.

"Will give two alone time." Mordin stated. "Shepard fragile. Medical opinion is to hold off on coitus until strength returns."

"I'll keep that in mind. Thank you, Mordin."

"Will also fax info packets regarding human-turian interspecies intercourse."

There was a deep inhale, "That's very kind of you."

"Of course. Happy to help!" Mordin chimed happily, missing the apparent sarcasm in the turian's voice.

They waited until the door shut behind him.

"Hi." She whispered.

"Hi." He whispered back.

"How are you fe—"

"Request?" She asked her words still slurred, cutting him off. He covered the other side of her hand, effectively sandwiching her between his warmth.

"I—" His voice was tense at first, but then he sighed, "Yes, anything you want."

She frowned, "Youbusy?"

"You don't have to worry about that. Right now, the only thing I can focus on is you." He answered.

"Laywithme?"

"I… I haven't left here. I never got a chance to change out of my armor."

"… So?"

"You know what? You're right. Hold on." He extricated himself from her grasp. She immediately felt the loss and found herself chasing after him.

"Whereareyougoing?"

"Shh." She wanted to watch him, but her neck felt like sludge. She heard the heavy clunks of his boots against Mordin's hardwood floors…

The lock clicked.

There was the clicking of latches followed by several loud _thunks_.

The bed dipped.

Hands were on her, rolling her against a solid cartilaginous chest. Her chin was tucked over the protrusion so unique to his anatomy while her fingers dug into the soft fabric of his undersuit. Their legs tangled together under the sheets and she swore in that moment, she must have been in heaven.

He smelled like leather and gun oil.

"Nohelmet." She muttered.

"That is correct."

"Cantseeyourface. Nofair." She slurred into his chest.

There was a warm chuckle. "Don't worry, you're not missing much. Plus, I'm not going anywhere anytime soon, you'll get your chance."

"Youfeelverygood." She patted his chest sloppily, "Ilikethis."

Anchored to his chest by one arm, she felt the other wind up and rake through her hair. "You know, I'm pretty damn partial to this as well."

"Nocoitus." She reminded with a lethargic giggle.

"When you say it so sexily like that, how can you expect me to resist you?" He answered.

Too tired to answer, she responded only with a sleepy kiss to the tender skin of his throat. His mouth plates pressed into her hair.

"Emma?"

She hummed.

She felt the sharp curve of his talon beneath her chin forcing her face to tilt up. Her eyes were closed, and she found it impossible to open them, to finally catch a glimpse—however muddy—of his face.

The planes of his mouth plates crashed against her lips. He was pliant and warm against her and she floated into Nirvana. When he moved to lean back against the pillow, she chased after him demanding more. He made a small noise and his tongue licked the seam of her lips, as though persuading her to invite him in. When she capitulated, she met him halfway and was swept away by his kiss. It was intoxicating, sweet, and everything she ever could have dreamed. When he pulled away, she forced her eyes to open.

His face was a blurry mess. All she could focus on were those beautiful, icy blue eyes.

"Never scare me like that again."


	14. Chapter 14

"The kidnappers," he began matter-of-factly, "performed an oophorectomy."

A battered Emma, mid-sip on a bottle of water, choked. Between sputtering gasps and chest thumps, she managed to squeak out a raspy, "Excuse me?"

Through the fabric of Mordin's nautically themed comforter, Archangel's gauntleted fingers flexed momentarily along the length of her leg. From the tensing in his posture alone, she could deduce that he was bracing himself for information that the salarian had already debriefed him on. It wasn't a good sign, but neither had been watching said turian immediately excuse himself when he realized she was awake.

At the base of the bed, Mordin cleared his throat, "Overall purpose still up for debate. However, conclusion indisputable. Surgical incision on lower abdomen. Scans detect no ovaries. Severe trauma to bilateral reproductive structures. No doubt: Oophorectomy. Sloppy. Gruesome. Unskilled."

Emma was at a loss for words. Her mouth would open, her lips attempting to put nebulous thoughts into words but would always flounder at the last second. The silence induced by her momentary aphasia was spoiled by the drone of a radio playing in another room. It was faint. The snippet she could just make out was about the ongoing restoration of the Citadel. How long ago had it been since she last been on the Presidium? Logically, it couldn't be more than a couple years, but it felt more like a lifetime ago.

"We," Archangel began, as though detecting her drifting thoughts, "decided it would be best if we told you as soon as possible. Nalah was very… _adamant_ that it was important for human women… said we should let you know so you could…."

The lack of closure to the sentence was a small comfort. At the very least, even the illustrious tactical genius that was Archangel was as equally at a loss for words in the matter.

She gave a small gesture. The cast on her hand made the movement stiff, "Alright then. Where do we go from here?"

Mordin blinked, surprised, "You rest. You heal."

He said this like it should have been obvious.

"No way."

She said this like it should have been obvious.

She propped herself higher on Mordin's conch-shaped pillow, "There's no time for resting."

"Shepard," Mordin's tone was sharp, "Kidnapped. Butchered. Drugged. Invaded."

"But—"

"—Bruised rib."

"Well, that's—"

"—Broken wrist."

"Dime a dozen—"

"Explosive ammunition to the foot—"

"Just a normal day on Omega—"

" _Class III hemorrhage_."

She pursed her lips.

Seizing his victory, "Trauma clouds your judgement."

She turned towards Archangel for his support in the matter but found she had bet on the wrong horse. Bird. Dinosaur. Whatever his closest earth equivalent was. Mordin approached her.

"Cannot pour from empty cup." Mordin's truth was simple and direct.

And for just a moment, she wavered.

"They have John."

This time, when the fingers flexed, they did not let go.

"What?"

"I saw him."

"You saw him?"

"Yes. Right before you found me."

"Emma…" The helmeted head tilted to the side, "When I got there, there was only that one Blue Sun in the room."

He said this with all the delicacy one might have when testing to see if the surface of the stove was still hot.

"If a loved one, hallucinations are not uncommon, especially when—"

Emma whisked the accusation from the air with a slap, "Don't do that to me, Mordin. I didn't make this up. I'm telling you: my brother was there."

This time, when it was the two men that the situational aphasia struck, the tense atmosphere was punctuated by a loud advertisement on the radio with a catchy, upbeat jingle for a program calling itself the Andromeda Initiative.

Leaning forward in his chair, her turian asked, "Are you seriously saying that Commander Shepard has been here on Omega all this time? Right under our noses?"

"I…" She grimaced, "I don't know. He was there, but he wasn't _there._ There was a vidcall. He was on the monitor. Physically, he could still theoretically be anywhere. But whoever is pulling the strings on the Suns has him— that much I know."

"You make it sound like it isn't just the Suns involved in his kidnapping."

"It isn't, but whoever is behind the curtain has put a lot of effort into making sure they're anonymous." She answered. As she stared into his visor, she fought the immature urge to add ' _much like someone else I know'._

"And you're sure it's him." He earned brownie points when he made this a statement, not a question.

She nodded.

A wave of relief washed over her as she watched him get to his feet, "If that's the case, then I need to go make some calls."

He gave her calf a single, hearty squeeze before taking off and made it so that only the two doctors remained.

Emma remembered something from before she woke up this time around and grimaced. She knew what was coming. It was inevitable and was going to be absolutely horrendous. Mordin's limited social graces granted him _just_ enough patience to keep his mouth closed until the doors had firmly slid shut.

 _Oh, no._

The tension in her muscles urging her to bolt out the door after Archangel mounted.

"Shepard…" He began, "Know different species react differently to stress."

She held up a hand, "No, please. Mordin, I love you from the bottom of my heart—I really do—but absolutely not: please don't give me the sex talk."

The salarian visibly deflated.

"But," He raised a datapad displaying diagrams of turian—human copulation techniques, "Prepared educational reproduction—"

"No!"

"But…" His lower lip jutted out, "Chafing?"

" _No_."

Defeated, Mordin dropped the tablet into his lap.

Sweet victory.

Triumphant, Emma patted his hand, "I know you meant well."

"Wanted to give advice as concerned medical professional." Mordin's back was to her now and he started rifling through the drawers of a rolling medical cart. "But if not: as colleague… as friend…. Necessary to remind that association with mercenaries problematic."

Emma answered with a reproachful look.

"Generally speaking. Nothing personal." With a satisfied _a-ha_ , Mordin pulled out what he had been looking for. He stuck a soft bud into each aural canal and tapped once on the diaphragm of his stethoscope. She chuckled.

"And what would you suggest my alternative to be? On Omega, my choices are: drug dealers, rapists, people who don't use headphones when they play music on the subway, and mercenaries." She made a sucking noise with her tongue against her teeth, "I don't know. I think a merc is the lesser of all the evils there."

"Could always _leave_ Omega. Always hated it. Perhaps, recent events sign not meant to be here."

"And miss out on the view? Name me anywhere else in this galaxy that I'll find more beautiful trash mountains—I'll wait!"

"Bright future. Dim on Omega." Mordin pinched the thin stem between his gloved thumb and forefinger.

"What do you want me to say?" When she tugged the collar of the borrowed sweater down, she noted evidence of a removed central line, "It's too scary out there in the real world—universe."

Mordin squinted at her and prodded that one very sore spot in her side with just enough pressure to remind her of the very 'real', very 'scary' world outside those doors.

"Aie! Alright, alright! That's enough thank you!" She squealed. "I don't know. I'm not gonna sit and pretend that everything is going to be hunky-dory. But I can't leave."

"Patients will not be abandoned." Mordin argued, " _Can_ handle influx."

Emma glanced towards the door. She heard the object of her attention in the next room arguing in hushed tones.

"It's not just them."

Mordin followed her gaze.

"And his reason for staying?"

"I'm not sure. But… I'm okay with that," She shrugged, "No one comes to Omega unless they're running from someone."

And for just a fleeting, almost _infinitesimal_ second, the great Mordin Solus found himself incapable of maintaining his grasp on that carefully laid, innocuous mask that he showed the world. It had not been the first time that Emma had caught him off guard, but each time this happened, she pieced a little bit more of the puzzle that made up the mystery that was this salarian. Emma's heart squeezed with regret regarding the phrasing, having completely forgotten that the aforementioned 'no one' had included her friend. For someone who averaged approximately one thousand words per minute, the fact that he had only mentioned his modifications to the genophage once spoke volumes.

It was only on Omega did it appear that Mordin could outrun that ghost, the ramification of his work in the Task Force.

He pressed the cold bell to her flesh, "Deep breaths."

She complied.

After he had urged her forward and still remained silent, she knew she had to act before that ghost fully took hold of her friend.

"So, when we're all done here," she rolled the wrist of her good hand, gesturing to nothing in particular, "Omega, I mean… we should go on a vacation… somewhere tropical."

"….Vacation?" He spoke the word as though he was trying it out for the first time.

"Yeah, you know—" The corners of her mouth twitched, "—that thing that normal people do to relax. I hear it's pretty neat to not feel the weight of the world on your shoulders. Just a rumor though, I can't say I've ever felt that before myself."

She took another sip of her water after she said this, allowing time to Mordin to reflect on the proposition. When her eyes darted back to him, he appeared to be mulling over the offer. He was pulling on gloves, lips moving silently as he sifted through his thoughts.

She picked up a scallop-shaped pillow and turned it over in her hands and the motion caught Mordin's attention.

"You always loved talking about the seashells." She noted warmly.

Mordin inhaled deeply. On the exhale, he gave her a smile, "Thank you, Shepard."

She clocked the side of Mordin's head lightly with the scallop.

"Lift top hem, please. Wish to see how infection is clearing." Mordin instructed, giving her enough space to swing her legs over the edge.

"So…" She hoisted the hem of her borrowed sweater up to her navel, "What happened? When I was… away?"

"Plague ongoing. Quarantine still in effect. Moved clinic to slums in meantime. Used immunoboosters. Slowed transmission, but…. Not enough. Cure slow to cultivate." He tapped a fingertip against his mouth, "Hmm… infection responding better to antibiotics than expected. Debridement unnecessary. Rate pain."

"Wait, Aria let you into the quarantine zone? Like, as in, she spoke to you… _directly_? How did _that_ go?" Emma's torso gave an enthusiastic wiggle, "Nonexistent. Now spill the beans!"

"Aria presumed you dead. Nowhere else for her to turn to. Had to be me, someone else—"

"—might've gotten it wrong. Yes! Yes, I know that, Aria knows that, even the old, hippie quarian lady that runs the paraphernalia store on Pyjak Way knows that. But, oh my god, _Mordin_ —" She grasped him by the lapels of his lab coat and shook him like a ragdoll—

" _Mordin_! You are the only person to have broken the only rule on Omega and lived to tell the whole, sordid, fantastic tale! Tell me, what did she _saaaaaaay_? What did the crow taste like when you," she slapped the bedding roughly, " _smacked_ that bad boy down on her dumb, leather couch? In such trying times, I must live vicariously through you—don't do this to me!"

"Do what?" She was still shaking him.

Emma released him with a frustrated grunt, "You're killing me!"

Mordin turned from her, but she caught sight of the smile he was attempting to suppress.

She gasped, "You. Jerk. I knew it! Something _did_ happen, didn't it?"

"Doctor—Patient confidentiality, Shepard. Would _never_ dream of—"

"Can it, salarian." Emma grumbled, pointedly looking away. "At least update me on what's going on with our _actual_ patients."

"No symptom improvement in Per'mon. No deterioration either"

"And the," Emma paused long enough to twinkle her fingers, "spooky, scary weirdo psycho-killer DNA thingamajig? Any update on that?"

"Yes."

"Yes, _what_?"

"Yes, there was an update."

"Well shit, Mordin. Try not to get too excited and tell me everything at once."

"Need you to test weight on uninjured foot." He instructed simply. She granted him a few seconds of silence to add his addendum. He did not.

Emma furrowed her brows, "Please, don't change the subject. What's going on?"

He offered her his hands to assist in sliding off the bed and frowned, "Parameters changed. Again."

"That's very ominous and all, but it doesn't tell me anything." The uninjured foot lowered to the floor without issue, bare toes burying into plush, sandy fibers. "Last time we had a 'change in parameters', you found that— HOLY FU—Holy glory hallelujah!"

The first part of the would-be expletive came out as a stream-of-consciousness bark, but she warped it at the last second into a sing song note as her injured foot jerked away from the pain and she found herself tripping ass backwards back onto the bed with a small yip.

A polite knock on the door turned both of their attentions away from her devastated foot, "Everything okay in there?"

"Fine!" Her voice cracked on the one syllable as the molten hot fire shot from the base of her foot and lodged itself somewhere between her knee and hip. "I'm fine! Just making sure Mordin works for his money!'

Mordin rifled through the rolling cart's compartments until he found a wad of gauze that she could use to mop the mat of sweat that was forming along her brow.

"More tags. Some different, some vaguely redundant," Mordin answered. He lowered himself back into a rolling chair near the bed and gave a 'come hither' motion with his hand. "Bring foot up. Want to try something new."

"Vaguely redundant? You gotta give me more to work with than that. What does that mean?" She plopped her foot unceremoniously into his lap.

"Tag on matriarch reads, ''Agari—Zhe—Dead—Arp—Useless' found in batarian partner as 'Agari—Zhe—Deed—Arp—Useness'." He used a pair of trauma shears to bite through the flesh-toned bandaging.

Emma gasped, both hands tenting before her mouth to cover the sound, "So, it's mutating rapidly! That could make this more like a game, simple phylogenetics to lead us to the patient zero of a particular strain."

"Precisely. Provided original message states, 'Asari—The—Dead—Are—Useless', we can determine patient zero of particular strain." The bindings peeled away from her foot to reveal the wound below, and it was here that Emma realized why it had hurt so badly to put pressure on it. It appeared that in such a bony area, the kinetic energy from the explosive round did more damage than she ever could have thought imaginable. Despite Mordin's careful ministrations, the dead center of her foot was… well, to put it mildly, destroyed, like so much raw meat packed into ruined flesh that could barely contain the carnage.

She made a sucking sound, thankful that the drugs she had been given took the edge off of what could have been excruciating experience.

"Did manage to find patient zeros. Other strains, though, not this particular line."

"Meaning you found non-mutated sequences?" She asked. Mordin popped the lid open on a massive, white, cylindrical container planted on the top of his cart. A puff of steam followed suit.

He dipped a measuring cup beneath the lip of the strange plastic container, "Yes. Only two. Another asari, young: Asari—Embrace—Perfection—Surround—Them"

She watched with apprehension as the measuring cup, now filled to the brim with a viscous, lime-green liquid that had the consistency of melted candle wax, teetered above her foot. When the sterile scent from the liquid wafted to her nose, Emma knew that her fears were not unfounded.

Mordin was preparing to hurt her real, _real_ bad.

Oh, she realized that he had only the best intentions, of course—but that didn't change the fact that salarian negative pressure gel applications were enough to send even the burliest of krogan warlords into fits. The rumors stated that the initial application made a splash of battery acid seem like holy water in comparison. But, the rumors from those lucky enough to receive a dose of the valuable medicine stated that she would probably be able to tap dance on the foot once the gel hardened into its final form.

Of course, she wouldn't actually be able to tap-dance—but that was more of an issue with the Shepard's infamous genetic proclivity for two left feet than any potential fault in the wound therapy.

In anticipation for the misery that was to come, Emma lowered herself in short increments until her back laid flat against the crumpled sheets and her view of the treasure trove of weird that was Mordin's bedroom was presented upside down. Since her position left her perpendicular to the bed itself, she nabbed two pillows from the bunch and used one as support. The other was left in reserves to cover her mouth for when the time came.

"And the other message you found?"

"Turian victim: Turian—The—Pale—Turian—Is—Weak." She heard the scrape of a bucket but did not dare to lift her head.

"Was the victim actually a pale turian?"

"No. Dark. Red plates. Black colony markings."

"Did either patient have any thoughts about their message?"

"Impossible to ask corpses, Shepard."

"You mean…. Both of them?"

"Mhm."

"Crap. Maybe it was referencing their mate?" She suggested.

"No. Dark grey. Purple colony markings. Female's stated 'Krgn. Tahk dh cistr'."

Emma's eyebrows perked, "Different strain. Sounds like it was originally krogan, too. How scandalous."

"Indeed. Other fragments found in live patients, as well. Unfortunately, all too deteriorated for translation. Frameshifts, deletions, insertions—all bothersome." He seemed to be talking more to himself at this point. He paused momentarily, "Prepare self. Will hurt."

Even with the warning, the first splash took her by surprise. The pain ripped a panicked shriek from her lungs, and she had only just managed to stifle the sound using the pillow. As she attempted to breathe through the pain, she narrowed her focus to a poster taking residence on the opposing wall. There, a stylized Mordin, dressed to the nines in over-the-top science garb, advertised for "SCIENCE FUN TODAY: Dr. Sol-ar System and His Fun Friends!". Below him, a saccharine varren fawned at his feet while a purring pyjak nestled against the scientist's damaged cranial horn.

If only it was cute enough to make her ignore the invisible sledgehammer that was whacking the crap out of her poor foot.

Once the first wave was over and she was capable of forming words, she asked, "And what's with the generalized targets? Why was Per'mon the only one solely singled out?"

Dread swarmed her as she heard Mordin dipping the cup back into the thick solution, "Lends credence to your baseline hypothesis. Killer lists species it wishes to test. Gathers results. Profits from perfected weapon. Impressive, actually."

"So," Emma began, trying to wrap her head around the new information, "We have a killer using the Gozu district to test out their weapons on different species and letting it spread on its own. I'm assuming if it dies out, they go back to the drawing board and re-infect the population?"

"Hypothesis would explain purpose of double targets with different messages, different infections." Mordin acknowledged.

"But, what about the messages—what do you make of them?"

"Unknown. Ready?"

She bit down on the pillow after telling him, "Go for it."

It seemed like Mordin attempted to distract her from the agony of the second round by speaking over it, "Not uncommon for serial killers to use vague statements. Hot air. Build intrigue. Differentiate oneself. Inflate ego. Nothing more than fluff."

The sharp smelling ooze dribbled slowly from the cup, boiling and thick over the in-tact skin without incident. Once it came in contact with the open muscle and sinew, the resulting shock compounded the pain she had experienced in the first round. Instinctively, her foot jerked, but the salarian was deceptively resilient and he locked her ankle into submission. The pain from it all had her body awash with sweat and she was fairly certain that her balled fists were shredding holes into Mordin's poor bedding.

"Remember to breathe!" Mordin reminded her, his tone cheerful and helpful.

"Oh, go fuck yourself, Mordin!"

If Mordin took the obscenities personally, he handled it like a champ, "Breathe! In. Out. In. Out."

"Argh! Shut up! Shut up!" Her breaths came through clenched teeth. With the poster no longer proving to be a good enough distraction from Mordin's onslaught, her gaze drifted down to the decorative table below the posters. On it, sat a pyjak-shaped hand puppet with ominous scorch marks and a disquieting tear near the (ever-so-slightly more disquieting) anatomically correct genitalia. Offhandedly, a thought flitted through her mind regarding an immediate kinship with the clearly burnt plushie space-monkey and whether the marks in the fur had been a result of Mordin's tinkering.

"Ready?"

"Shit, no!"

The sick bastard went and did it anyway.

It appeared that Mordin thought going slower would be more merciful.

Nuh-uh.

"FUCK ME WITH SANDPAPER" She was screaming into the pillow loud enough that the words were only barely disguised.

She heard Mordin give a sadistic snort. The jerk.

She wasn't so much as breathing now, as she was testing the limits of her lung capacity with great heaping gasps of air. Beads of sweat, like bullets, shuddered down the sides of her face. A globule of liquid, boiling and syrupy, spilled from the wound and descended down the edge, across her Achilles tendon, down to her heel where the droplet quivered twice before dripping into the bucket held between Mordin's feet. She was blinking moisture from her eyes, her muscles incapable of doing anything other than staring at the ceiling.

A polite knock interrupted the fiasco.

"Come in!" The untroubled bubbliness in Mordin's invitation roused Emma's undeserved ire. _Awfully peppy for someone making Emma feel like the very flesh was being torn from her person._ Surely, she would have to make him pay.

Archangel paused in the doorway. He seemed to be taken aback by the fact that despite the racket she had been making, she had not, in fact, been cleaved in two. "Did uh… an animal die in here?"

Emma propped herself up ever so slightly, "Not an animal, no."

"With all the fuss you were making, I was expecting there to be a lot more blood." Archangel teased, "Pansy."

Emma pushed at the few sweat-soaked strands that clung to her brow, "Oh-ho! Watch it now! If the roles were reversed the night we met, I can guaren-goddamn-tee you that you would have sworn I was hired to finish you off!"

He hummed his amusement at her wrath and settled onto the bed behind her, "Alright you tough-as-nails human, do you think you can sit up? Or, should I just skip all that and call in the cavalry to avenge your death?"

"I got it, I got it," She muttered, craning her neck to stare up at the helmet hovering above her, "Just don't ask me to lift my arms. I'm 98% sure I got pit stains the size of turian frigates under each arm."

Archangel snorted and, despite her oh-so-dire warnings, lifted her up by her arms into an upright position, "Last I heard, sweat is made out of water, not battery acid. I think I'll live."

She sighed, leaning against her turian for support before rounding on Mordin, "Call me crazy, but I think that you're making a big mistake by downplaying the importance of the messages."

"No purpose in devoting attention to messages now. Plague spreading. Symptoms worsening without intervention. Whole district dying in droves. No time for codebreaking. Too dangerous for witch-hunt." Mordin argued. To her immense relief, he had set the cup down and the green ooze appeared to be in the initial phases of solidifying into a hard crust.

"But," She countered, "If we use them to find the killer then we can stop them before they introduce an even _more_ lethal iteration. I mean, aside from Per'mon, they don't really seem to care who or what they kill, so long as it's in the Gozu district. What if their ultimate goal is the rest of the station? Blasto forbid this thing leaves the system."

The goo on her foot grew opaque and now obscured the damn near perfect hole in her foot from view. Mordin gave her an exasperated look as his hand sliced through the air, "No victims survive or remember attack. Total of four messages recovered. No clues. No preexisting link between victims. No cure. No vaccine. _No time._ "

"But, think about it for a minute, would you? There're so many things these messages could possibly be! What if—oh!—What if, it's a stream of consciousness from the creator? Maybe… uh… maybe it's a final insult, a sort of message from the killer to the victim?" She took in a sharp intake of air, "What if they're not for the creator _or_ the victims? What if they're messages for us?"

"Shepard." The tone told her he thought she was losing her marbles.

"Listen, you're not going to convince me that someone went through all this effort for—for—I don't know, shits and giggles?" Now that the goo had solidified into a pliable waxy paste, Mordin's fingers went to work molding the medicine into a uniform shape around her foot. The fact that she did not so much as experience a twinge of discomfort was a testament to the gel.

"Have personally gone to Armex Arsenal Arena in Carrd District with you. Both know Easter Eggs exist for Easter Egg's sake. Crowd pleasers. Attention catchers. Intrigue builders."

"That just seems so…" Emma searched for the word, "Cheap."

"Reality, Shepard. Often more disappointing than supposition." Mordin responded, releasing his hold on her foot. He retrieved the bucket from between his legs and poured the excess goop back into the white cylinder on his cart. "Try standing, please."

Mordin took to his feet and she followed suit, recreating her previous attempt with great success. Happily, she rocked on her feet and was ecstatic with the results. She beamed up at him, "Nothing beats salarian medicine, I'm telling you!"

What happened next was something that transcended not only species, star systems, and cultures, but educational levels. Like every ass that thought they could best science and conquer common sense, Emma tested the boundaries of the hardened medicine by balancing the bulk of her weight above where the majority of damage had accumulated. And, like every ass, she suffered the consequences when a streak of flame shot up the nerve and threatened to put her back on her ass.

Mordin flicked her on the nose, "Should know better."

"I deserved that." She admitted, rubbing the blooming red splotch on her nasal bridge.

Mordin removed his gloves and threw them in a biohazard bin, "Exam complete. Should be able to leave whenever you want."

"You think she's going to live, doc?" Archangel asked. Emma, who had decided to assist Mordin in cleaning up the mess that had accumulated during her unexpected (and extended) sleepover, stuck her tongue out at him over the salarian's shoulder.

"Prognosis good. Provided she stay out of trouble." Mordin answered.

"Who? Me? When did I ever get into trouble?" She raised her hands innocently. "My purity has earned me the honorary role as the next drell saint."

This earned yet another flick to the nose.

"Ow! Did they teach you how to flick people in PT?" She winced.

Mordin didn't answer, "Currently craving human food. Going out to get pizza, pineapple variety. Would you like to accompany?"

Emma's nose crinkled, "Ew. Thank you, but I think I'll pass. Unless…"

She glanced backwards at Archangel. He shook his head.

"Suit yourselves!" Mordin chirped happily, his tone seeming to imply that they were missing out by passing on the abomination that he (and a few other misguided souls) called pizza. He stowed away the last of the equipment and was nearly out the door when Emma stopped him.

"Hey, wait! When do you want me back in the clinic to help out with the quarantine?"

"I think that—"

This time, it was the turian behind her that cut the doctor off, "You have got to be joking."

Emma and Mordin glanced at each other, stunned.

"Hey, Mordin," Emma said softly, "Would it be okay if—"

"If I ordered the pizza? Of course. Will set alarms to lock after you two leave." Mordin interrupted, sensing the incoming storm on the horizon. As he passed over the threshold, he twisted at the waist to add, "Do keep damage to a minimum, please. Much enjoy my furnishings as is."

The very moment Mordin had vacated the premises, she pivoted until she was faced to face with the heavily armed _and_ armored turian seated on the seashell-laden bed. Emma could practically hear the Wild, Wild West whistle trill in the background as they stared each other down.

"You know that I am not the type of person to sit on my hands while people are dying." Her voice was low and dangerous.

"That may be," His voice mimicked hers, "But, I also know that you haven't been conscious for six days."

It was a low blow, and a fact that she had not been aware of until now. She inhaled deeply, nearing the man until her knees bumped against the frame of the bed. "This is bigger than me. I don't care if my head's cut off and I have to carry it around in a backpack, I'm going. Same thing goes for finding John."

"Bringing the Commander home won't mean anything if he comes back only to find his sister died in the process."

Her hand sliced through the air, "It has to be me!"

"No, it doesn't. Especially not when you woke up an hour ago." He sounded so goddamn reasonable. It was unfair that all of her emotions were right there in the open while his were obscured by the helmet.

"You ran off in the middle of the night. You nearly died on my floor and you ran off in the middle of the night." She emphasized the accusation with the point of her index finger on her braced hand.

He leaned forward, "And that was different."

"Different?" She sputtered, "I pulled six bullets out of your jejunum alone!"

"And say you go to the quarantine zone, where I don't have access," He pointed his thumb over his shoulder, "How do you know that they're not going to take you again?"

There had been no shift in tone, but the vulnerability that had been presented was more than enough to wrench the wind from her sails. It was now evident how to best remedy the situation.

She raised one knee up and settled it onto the bed in front of him.

"Because they," she murmured as she hoisted the bad leg up onto the bed as well. The movement had her kneeling before his seated position, which put them equally chest to carapace, "Messed with the wrong family. I'm not sure if anyone's clued you in on this secret…"

With her good hand, she formed a half-circle and held it to the side of her mouth as though she was confiding in him the darkest of secrets, "But, messing with Shepard's is hazardous to one's health."

"Emma," he warned, "I'm serious."

She pressed her hand flat against her chest, "Oh, believe me. So am I."

His anxiety came in the form of fidgeting hands and a helmet directed down towards his lap. He had been her rock in so many instances before, she knew it was time for her to return the favor. She took the reins in the situation by grabbing ahold of those fumbling hands. She planted them on either side of her waist, urging him to take comfort in her by smoothing the fingers until they were flat against the knitted fabric. There was a flutter in her stomach, an anxiety that questioned whether he would pull from her the moment she let go. But, when her fingers released his, she felt an increase in gentle pressure of metal pressing into her sides.

"You vanished. For nearly two whole weeks, you disappeared without a trace."

"Hey," She cooed in her most soothing voice, she brought her hands to the helmet's edge and lifted until the visor was trained on her face rather than his navel, "I'm right here. And I'm not going to let them take me again. Ever. And—" At this proximity, she could just vaguely make out the icy blue she knew laid beneath the dark screen of his visor and realization dawned on her.

"—And… this isn't about me, is it?"

This heralded the return of the near-painful flexing of talons into her skin. A shiver ran through her poor turian and she yearned to pull him closer and soothe whatever emotional ailments plagued him. Instead, he dropped his hold, scooted backwards until he was far enough away from her that he could hop off the bed and then turned his back to her.

"You can trust me. What happened?"

"I disbanded my team."

A punch to the face would have been less shocking.

Her mouth dropped open and she was only barely capable of squeaking out a feeble, "What?"

Next to the stylized poster, there was a massive widow that overlooked the district. Archangel strode purposefully towards it, nudging aside a small mountain of pyjak and varren hand puppets with his toe in order to gain better access.

His back was still towards her when he stated, "Because of you, I—"

It was almost physically impossible for her to let him finish that sentence. She hastily took to her feet, "Hey! You can't give up on everything because of—"

Before she could reach the window, he twisted just enough to halt her tirade with his hand, "Let me finish. _Because of you,_ I was given a chance to save my men before an oversight on my end got them all killed."

He remained in that contorted position long enough for her to breathe out, "The datapad."

He nodded once before twisting back towards the window. Even she could tell that he was only pretending to observe what was going on below.

"Shit." She whispered. She joined him and planted her elbows on the eggshell painted wood. Several stories below, Omega somehow continued to function, bathed in the harsh crimson glow that permeated nearly every facet of the station. The minutes ticked by as they feigned interest in the comings and goings of hundreds of people. The more athletically inclined jogged or biked along a neon yellow stripe on the periphery of the street, others chose to sit either by themselves or in small clusters along that path, while the rest meandered slowly about. She could almost pretend that she was looking at a normal city.

"I don't know what happened. I thought we had been so careful." He stated suddenly, interrupting the silence, "But, it's too dangerous now. I don't know who I can trust, so I put a cease and desist out until I can get to the bottom of it all. They're not going to die because of me."

She dared to glance up at him, but the helmet was definitively _not_ pointed in her direction.

"Are they giving you a hard time about it?"

"Some are. Some aren't. Everyone got a copy of what was in the datapad, so if they act against my orders, it will be on their own heads."

"What was on that datapad?"

"I'm not entirely sure," He confessed, "It's mostly correspondence between different people. Without the proper context, I'm afraid it's difficult to piece the whole thing together. But the scariest thing is that they've somehow discovered several of my safehouses—nearly all of them, in fact."

Impulsively, she gripped his arm, "Nalah! Butler! Are they—"

She was waved off, "They're fine. Everyone's… fine. For now. Just worried about _keeping_ them all safe is all. It's difficult though. Everyone's in on it."

Her brows knitted together, "How do you figure?"

"Eclipse, Blood Pack, Blue Suns. They're all in on it. The main message thread that you found was between Jaroth and Tarak."

"I can't say that those names ring any bells." Out of all the faces she was capable of discerning, Emma recognized only one batarian mug. She often saw him near Harrot's Emporium. It was the shoddy crate that gave him away. He dropped his makeshift stage down in the most heavily trafficked portion of the street. This came to the annoyance of just about every pedestrian whose path he had now impeded. The few humans that resided in this district were smart enough to give him a wide berth as he shouted his anti-human jargon.

"Jaroth is the head of Omega's Eclipse chapter. Tarak for the Blue Suns. They also have Garm from the Blood Pack thrown into all this, but his role is mostly muscle. You should remember him. He would be the reason why I ended up with the—ah, six bullets in my jejunum. Tarak appears to have the biggest role in all this, but I don't know how he got my information, or just how you got factored into the plans. Before we got out, you mentioned that there was a connection, do you still remember what it was?"

There was a muscle spasm in Emma's upper back that demanded her attention. She maintained her hold on the windowsill as she pulled the remainder of her body away from the glass. The resulting stretch felt delicious as she spoke, "Whoever has John enticed the mercs with a plan to get to you if they agreed to take me."

There was another long pause as the vigilante digested the information. Several skycars whizzed mere meters from them. Eventually, he spoke again. "There's no way I had gotten careless. I just _know_ someone leaked it all. And when I find out who, I'm going to make them pay for nearly screwing my entire team like this."

She slipped her hand over his, "You'll get them. There's not a single doubt in my mind."

He snorted, and for just a second he diverted his attention down at her, "What? No finger wagging? No telling me not to be so hotheaded?"

"I think—" She pursed her lips to the side and felt a cheerful glint reach her eyes, "given my current situation, that I am in no position to be lecturing anyone on being hotheaded."

"Color me surprised." His tone was amused. She shifted on her hip to face him better.

"Would you prefer if I gave you a good chewing out?" She began to brush imaginary dust from her shoulders, "Because, I mean, I don't want to _brag_ or anything like that, but I think my time with noncompliant patients has given me the galaxy's _best_ scolding voice. I'm not too sure if you're ready for it yet."

"I've had a lot of experiences with people in your line of work. I can't say that many of them would feel the same as you about murder."

She fought the urge to dig deeper into the small window he provided into his past. Had he been around many doctors because of work? Family reasons? Personal reasons? No. Now was not the time to pry. Now was the time to be there for him.

"Are you kidding? You need me to get Mordin back in here?" She jerked her chin towards the door on the opposite side of the room while her voice dropped into a conspiratorial whisper, "When I first got here, we worked in his clinic together. On one of the days I was scheduled, the Blood Pack thought it would be smart to rile him up and raid the clinic. The crazy bastard neural shocked one goon so hard, that the chick's head exploded all over my patient! Just like that! Boom! Squirt! Bleh!"

"Sounds like one hell of a mess to clean up afterwards." He mused. Archangel shifted, leaning his back against the window so that he had an easier time looking down at her.

"Oh, it was. But, Mordin's got all the neato tech toys from when he was alien James Bond."

"Who's that? Is he like the Bath-man guy you and Geoff always compare me to?"

"Batman," She corrected, "And, something like that. Next time we get together, in the increasingly unlikely scenario that we are not yanking one another's butts out of the fire, I'll show you one of those vids. They're schlock, but I think it would be cool for you to get some zappy one-liners for the next time you're hide deep in baddies."

Archangel hummed, "You almost had me there, for a second."

Emma cocked her head to the side, "I beg your pardon?"

He took her hand and stretched the five, exposed, fleshy fingers against his three protected ones. "If I didn't know better, Doctor Shepard, I would think that you were trying to distract me from my mood swings."

Emboldened, Emma followed the line of her hand and folded herself against his form. She took advantage of the natural, vertical gap between his wide chest plates and flared hip spurs to slip her arms through. At the curve of his back, she used her grip of one hand on the cast of her opposite wrist as leverage to pull him close.

"Only if it's working."

She was rewarded for her honesty when he returned the gesture by draping his arms over her shoulders.

"It just might be." Unfortunately, the words didn't sound as convincing and she knew she had more work set out for her. Beneath the words and the touch, she could sense the self-doubt brooding just beneath the surface.

She stood on tiptoe and stretched her neck until she was capable of resting her chin on the swell of his carapace.

"Listen, I know you've never wanted to tell me about the exact reason why you came to Omega—"

This time, it seemed like it was his turn to be physically incapable of letting her complete the sentence, "I'm sorry about that. It's just that—"

The apology was unnecessary, so she spoke over him, " _And_ , I'll continue to patiently wait until you feel it's time for that to change. But I don't need you to explain to me that you've never been the Omega type. Because you're not. If you're here, it's because you're like me and John. Or, like Mordin and his work with the STG. Or…like Butler and… well, whoever Butler must have pissed off to get his happy, former C-Sec ass shipped off to this steaming dump."

Archangel snorted, "In a shocking twist of fate, I have been told that the Butlers' exile was actually Nalah's doing. Not Geoff's."

That momentarily put everything to a screeching halt. The still-red skin of her nose scrunched as she asked, "Seriously?"

"If I could, I would tell you the story. Unfortunately, I know I won't be able to do it justice. I'll have to remind her to tell you next time you're together—which, should be soon by the way. She has been worried sick about you and threatened me with castration if I don't bring you over as soon as you're ready. If I remember correctly, she used a suspicious amount of very technical details relating to turian anatomy. Details, I would like to add, that no non-medically trained human should be aware of."

"I'll keep that in mind." Emma told him after snorting a puff of air out of her nose, "But allow me to get this derailed train back on track for a second… Omega is shit. It's teeming with mercs, drowning in slavers, filled to bursting with just about every sort of shitty person this galaxy has to offer, _and_ possibly the most god-awful sanitation maintenance I have _ever_ come across. But… this is salvation for people like us. We help others in order to help ourselves. Mordin and I do it by healing patients. You and your team do it by executing dangerous people.

"What I'm trying to say is that: I get it. I know more than anyone else what the people under your command mean to you. I don't doubt that you genuinely care about keeping them alive, but it's more than that, isn't it?" She jostled him slightly before he had a chance to answer the rhetorical question, "This isn't just your fight, your salvation anymore. This burden isn't only yours to bear. It's both of ours. I knew what I was getting into when we made this official. We're a team. No kidnapping or Eclipse-Blue Suns-Blood Pack pact is going to scare me off now."

Immediately, one hand moved to the back of her head, urging it forward until she was tucked beneath the chin while the other pressed her so tight, she could have sworn she would be phasing _through_ him if he added any more pressure. For a few heartbeats, there was nothing but the rise and fall of their breaths.

The subharmonics her translator could not decipher caused the metal in his chest plate to quiver against her skin, "What about if they throw district-wide plagues and grave robbers into the mix?"

"Not a chance." She reaffirmed.

He sighed, a defeated sound. "So…there's still no way I'm going to talk you into sitting out of things for a few more days?"

"Not a chance." She repeated.

"Well, can't say I didn't try. It was worth a sh—oh! I need to take this call, hold on. Just in time, too." She stepped back just far enough that he could easily take the call without worrying about her eavesdropping. At that distance, all she heard was the characteristic buzz of an earpiece cut between intermittent confirmatory and negative grunts from Archangel's end. He ended the call with a terse, "Thanks for arranging the meeting, Barla Von. I'll be there soon."

The call then clicked dead.

Emma shifted her weight to the uninjured foot and folded her arms across her chest, "Barla Von? Why do I know that name?"

For just a single instance, Emma could have sworn she saw Archangel wince, but it was over so quickly that she could never have been sure. "He worked on the Presidium. Chances are that you dealt with him when you worked at Huerta."

"Huh… eh…. OH! Yes! I do remember him. Volus. Always got an iffy vibe from him though. But how do you know him? Why is he calling you?" Try as she might on this one, the suspicion was impossible to disguise.

"Because he's our best bet in finding the Commander." With this, Archangel reached behind his back and pulled out his rifle. Emma was left to observe as he popped open a side compartment and counted the number of rounds that he had left on that particular heat sink.

"And why exactly are we getting that out for?" Her eyebrow was perked.

"It's a necessary precaution," He informed her. When he was done, he maglocked the rifle back into place. "Because we're about to get ourselves involved with the Shadow Broker."


End file.
